Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-2-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2024/paper-1/8/b/solution

Set and use the Frobenius solution with . From part (a), the leading coefficients are and . The coefficient of the lowest power is therefore
The indicial equation reduces to , giving
Since , the two indicial roots differ by a nonzero imaginary number, not an integer. Thus the two local Frobenius solutions exist independently on a chosen branch of .

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