Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-short-options-paper-shared-by-prelims-and-parts-a-and-b-of-the-physics-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2016/s7/3/1/solution

Vary with fixed endpoints. Integration by parts gives , hence the Euler-Lagrange equations. Define and, assuming an invertible velocity-momentum relation, . The equivalent action is . Independent variations of and yield
Boundary terms vanish for fixed endpoint coordinates; constraining momenta independently at the same endpoints is unnecessary. Singular Lagrangians require constraint analysis instead of this unconstrained Legendre transform.

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