Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-2-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2023/paper-1/10/a/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 2 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge 2023 Paper 1 10 a Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-18
The original PDF has a typographical omission: its displayed equation has rather than on the right. Taken literally, it is an inhomogeneous boundary value problem, not the stated Sturm-Liouville problem. The quotient and the later eigenfunction expansion identify the intended equation, which the following derivation produces explicitly.
Choose homogeneous Dirichlet boundary conditions and a nonzero real admissible . Then because . For an endpoint-zero variation , integration by parts givesThe first variation of the Rayleigh quotient is thusBy the fundamental lemma of the calculus of variations, stationarity is equivalent toConversely, multiply this corrected eigenvalue equation by and integrate. The same boundary cancellation gives , so the first variation vanishes. This proves the requested equivalence for the intended equation. Homogeneous Neumann boundary conditions, or a Dirichlet condition at one end and a Neumann condition at the other, also eliminate the boundary term. General Robin boundary conditions would require the corresponding boundary contribution in the numerator.
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