Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-physics-course-of-the-year-4-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2014/paper-1/b3/solution
Past exam of the physics course of the year 4 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge 2014 Paper 1 B3 Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-20
For noninteracting particles, a many-particle configuration has and . Summing independently over allowed occupations therefore factorizes the grand partition function:At fixed , differentiating the original state sum gives and , soFor one level, write . Fermions allow , giving and . Bosons allow all nonnegative integers, giving and , with . ThusThe grand-canonical single-level occupation variance follows from the same derivative identity applied to one level:In the high-temperature nondegenerate regime, and both approach classical Poisson-like fluctuations, . At low temperature, nearly filled or empty fermion levels have strongly suppressed fluctuations; only the Fermi-surface window changes occupation. Highly occupied low-energy boson levels can instead have , showing bosonic enhancement. This last statement depends on occupation and reservoir chemical potential, not temperature alone; grand-canonical condensate fluctuations must not be confused with a fixed-total-number ensemble.
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