Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-2-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2002/paper-1/6/b/solution

Let for integer . In the even or odd power series whose parity matches , the numerator in the recurrence relation vanishes at the coefficient of . All coefficients of lower powers in that parity are nonzero, and all higher ones vanish. Therefore a polynomial solution exists, of polynomial degree , containing
For nonnegative these are the Chebyshev polynomials . The normalized low-degree cases follow directly from the recurrence relation:
Enforcing gives
To see that normalization at one is always possible, set in the Chebyshev differential equation. For , the differential expression becomes . Thus gives on and has value one at . It is a polynomial because the cosine addition formula gives . Negative integer produces the same solution as .

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