Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-theoretical-physics-major-option-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2018/6/b/solution

For the sextic polynomial to be bounded below at large while allowing either sign of , its leading coefficient must obey
If , the free energy tends to as , so it cannot define an equilibrium within this truncation. The exceptional case is stable for and gives the ordinary quartic Landau theory; it cannot stabilize the negative- region required for the full sextic phase diagram. Higher positive powers could stabilize a negative , but they are absent from this model.

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