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/s7/3/2/solution

Phase space combines all independent canonical coordinates and momenta. Its Hamiltonian velocity has divergence by equality of mixed derivatives. Thus an infinitesimal material phase volume has zero fractional rate of change. This is Liouville's theorem, valid also for explicitly time-dependent Hamiltonians. It preserves fine-grained volume, not necessarily the area of any projected coordinate pair.

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