Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2019 iii Paper 315 2 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
Assume all three planets retain approximately their original hydrogen-helium bulk composition. Stellar encounters change orbital energy and irradiation, not automatically the planet's elemental abundances. Their atmospheric structures can become approximately stationary long before their interiors finish cooling.
For the unperturbed Jupiter-like planet at , the zero-albedo globally averaged planetary equilibrium temperature is about . Stellar light heats the outer atmosphere, while internal cooling supports a deeper temperature gradient and convection. At cooler pressures, chemical equilibrium favors methane and ammonia; condensate clouds can include ammonia at high levels and water deeper down. Disequilibrium chemistry in an exoplanet atmosphere can preserve carbon monoxide or other species from deeper layers.
For the inward-migrated planet at , the irradiation-only planetary equilibrium temperature is ten times higher, about , because . Its irradiated planetary atmosphere has a heated radiative exterior, potentially strong day-night differences, and a deep radiative-convective boundary. At suitable pressures, chemical equilibrium increasingly favors carbon monoxide over methane; water remains important, while alkali absorption and high-temperature condensates can matter. An atmospheric thermal inversion depends on absorbers, clouds, and irradiation and is not guaranteed simply by migration.
The ejected object is a rogue planet. Its irradiation-based planetary equilibrium temperature becomes very small, but its actual emitting temperature is set primarily by internal cooling and Kelvin-Helmholtz contraction. After only several million years it can remain warm and self-luminous, with deep convection and an outward-cooling radiative atmosphere. Its photospheric chemistry and clouds depend on that cooling temperature; they cannot be inferred from the absence of a host star alone. None of these cases fixes an exact pressure-temperature profile without a cooling model, opacities, and atmospheric composition.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2019 ii Paper 3 14B Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-03
In chemical equilibrium, the reaction obeys chemical-potential balance for ionizationbecause a photon gas in equilibrium has photon chemical potential . Applying the given nonrelativistic Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution to each massive species givesThe Hydrogen binding energy is in units with . Thus Saha's equation isFor ground-state hydrogen, and , so the degeneracy factor is one. Since , the translational factor is commonly written .
Charge neutrality gives . Write . Thenand henceCombining this with the stated photon density produces
In our universe the baryon-to-photon ratio is tiny, so there are roughly photons per baryon. Even when the mean photon energy is far below , the high-energy blackbody radiation tail contains enough ionizing photons to suppress neutral hydrogen. The recombination temperature is reached only after the Boltzmann factor overwhelms this large photon-to-baryon ratio, at .
For a universe with , take the degeneracy factor as one, , and define . Neutral formation occurs when the boxed ratio is of order one, giving approximatelyWith and , this gives and thereforeto order unity. This is much hotter than recombination in our universe because there is no enormous excess of photons, but it remains below because the electron's large translational phase space still favours the ionized state.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2020 ii Paper 4 9D Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-09-29
Chemical equilibrium for gives , because the photon chemical potential vanishes. Applying the nonrelativistic number-density formula to all three massive species and taking the ratio givesUse charge neutrality , the Hydrogen binding energy , , and the ground-state statistical weights . ThenThe approximations are a dilute, nondegenerate ideal gas in thermal and chemical equilibrium, nonrelativistic electrons, protons and hydrogen, negligible excited hydrogen states, and negligible corrections from the proton-to-hydrogen mass ratio. This relation is the Saha ionization equation.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2022 iii Paper 310 2 a Solution 2026-09-28
Chemical equilibrium for requires , since the photon chemical potential vanishes. Inserting the nonrelativistic Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution and using charge neutrality giveswhere the proton-to-hydrogen mass ratio and the stated degeneracy factors have been approximated by one. Thus
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2023 ii Paper 3 9B Solution Created 2026-09-23 Updated 2026-09-25
In the nonrelativistic regime,The assumption puts the Fermi-Dirac distribution in its Maxwell-Boltzmann limit, soTherefore the nonrelativistic Maxwell--Boltzmann number density is
For , chemical equilibrium and the vanishing photon chemical potential implyApplying the number-density formula to each massive species and eliminating the chemical potentials givesUse charge neutrality, , the mass approximation , and the convention in the question that suppresses the order-one internal-degeneracy ratio . With the Hydrogen binding energywe obtain the Saha ionization equationThe assumptions are thermal equilibrium and chemical equilibrium before cosmological recombination, a nonrelativistic nondegenerate gas, zero photon chemical potential, charge neutrality, negligible proton-electron mass correction in the translational prefactor, and the stated degeneracy-factor approximation.
Residual electron freeze-out 2026-10-07
When the effective recombination rate per Electron becomes smaller than the expansion rate, the small remaining ionized fraction can no longer track chemical equilibrium. A nonzero Electron fraction remains, exceeding the exponentially small Saha equation prediction. The effective rate includes atomic radiative bottlenecks; chemical freeze-out is distinct from photon decoupling by scattering.
Thermal dissociation 2026-10-06
Thermal dissociation is temperature-driven breaking of a molecule into simpler fragments. The chemical equilibrium abundance depends on pressure as well as temperature: reactions increasing particle number are generally favored at low pressure. In an exoplanet atmosphere, reduced water on a very hot dayside does not by itself establish a low planetary oxygen abundance.
For one particle species in chemical equilibrium under , chemical balance gives , hence . Elastic imposes no such constraint. In an expanding universe the number-changing reaction must remain fast compared with the Hubble parameter; after chemical freeze-out a nonzero chemical potential can develop even if elastic collisions maintain kinetic equilibrium.