Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2018 iii Paper 301 4 v Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
For a translation with the sign used in the paper, the field variation at fixed coordinates is , and . Differentiating the Maxwell Lagrangian with respect to the field gradient givesThus Noether's theorem yields , where the canonical stress-energy tensor of the Maxwell field isIt is conserved on the source-free Maxwell equations, but it is not generally symmetric. Indeed,need not vanish. For example, take , , and the other components zero, with nonzero constants . This produces constant field strength and satisfies the source-free equations, but and .
Nor is it gauge-invariant: while and are unchanged, a gauge transformation giveswhich is generally nonzero. These shortcomings motivate the improvement in part (vi); they do not contradict conservation of the canonical stress-energy tensor.