Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 117 1 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Use the nonnegative sign convention for the Laplace-Beltrami operator; the ambient Laplacian has the same sign convention. Changing both signs changes the signs of the eigenvalues below. Let be an orthonormal basis of , and let be the unit-speed geodesic with and . The geodesic Hessian formula givesIndeed, the second derivative along a geodesic is , because its covariant acceleration is zero. Taking the trace of the Hessian matrix in this orthonormal basis gives the displayed Laplace-Beltrami operator.
For the sphere, put , where , and write for a smooth ambient function. The Euclidean metric becomes and its volume form is . The coordinate formula for the Laplace-Beltrami operator therefore gives the polar-coordinate Laplacian identityFor , restriction to yieldsThis relation also has a direct geodesic proof. At a point , complete an orthonormal basis of the tangent space by the radial vector . Each great-circle geodesic satisfies . The chain rule gives . Summing and comparing with the ambient trace gives precisely the radial correction above.
Let be the space of homogeneous polynomials of degree on , and let be its subspace of harmonic polynomials. For , homogeneity gives . Substituting in the polar-coordinate Laplacian identity proves that its restriction is a spherical harmonic withRestriction is injective on : if , homogeneity makes zero away from the origin, hence everywhere.
To count and exhaust these eigenfunctions, use the harmonic decomposition of homogeneous polynomialsHere is an algebraic proof rather than an assumption about the spectrum. On polynomials put the Fischer inner product . Multiplication by is adjoint to , so multiplication by is adjoint to . In finite-dimensional inner product spaces, the orthogonal complement of the image of multiplication by is . This proves the decomposition. Multiplication by is injective, sowhere the second term is zero for .
Iterating the harmonic decomposition of homogeneous polynomials and restricting to expresses every polynomial restriction as a finite sum of spherical harmonics. Polynomial restrictions contain constants and separate points of the sphere, so the Stone-Weierstrass theorem makes them uniformly dense in the continuous functions, and hence dense in . The Laplace-Beltrami operator is self-adjoint, and eigenfunctions with different eigenvalues are orthogonal. If a smooth eigenfunction had an eigenvalue not in the list, it would be orthogonal to a dense subspace and would vanish. If it had a listed eigenvalue, subtracting its orthogonal projection onto the corresponding finite-dimensional gives the same contradiction. Thus, for , the spectrum of the Laplacian on a sphere isIn particular, the zero eigenvalue has multiplicity one; on each positive eigenvalue has multiplicity two; on the multiplicity is .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 117 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
A flat torus is the quotient , where is a full-rank Euclidean lattice, with the Riemannian metric induced from the Euclidean metric. Translation by a lattice vector is a Riemannian isometry, so this metric is well defined and has zero curvature. Its volume is the covolume of .
The dual lattice is . For , the function descends to the flat torus, and direct differentiation givesConversely, write and . Ordinary Fourier series on have frequencies , corresponding to . After normalization they form a complete orthonormal basis in , and the Fourier coefficients of a smooth function decay rapidly. Applying the Laplace-Beltrami operator term by term shows that a smooth eigenfunction with eigenvalue has nonzero coefficients only where . Thus the spectrum of a flat torus isThe formula counts multiplicity over either the real or complex numbers: the two frequencies give the real sine and cosine functions.
For the rigidity assertion in dimension two, it suffices to reconstruct a rank-two Euclidean lattice from its vector-length multiset. The multiset first determines its covolume . Indeed, a bounded fundamental parallelogram, and comparison of the cells meeting a disk with slightly larger and smaller disks, give the lattice-point asymptotics by fundamental cellsThe spectrum determines , including multiplicities, so it determines .
Let be the smallest nonzero vector length, and choose with . This vector is primitive: with would contradict minimality. From the length multiset subtract the two vectors at every positive length , for . The shortest remaining length is exactly the length of a shortest vector . This subtraction is legitimate even if several directions have length : it subtracts just two copies, and then . It also proves that is independent of our choice of shortest direction. Replace by to arrangeThe replacement stays outside and cannot be shorter than , so a reduced choice still has length .
The shortest-independent-vector basis lemma says that are a basis of . To prove it, choose coordinates with . Because is primitive, ; let be the smallest positive vertical coordinate in . Write , with after changing its sign. If , a vector of vertical coordinate , reduced horizontally modulo , hasThis contradicts the definition of , since . Hence and generate .
The Gram matrix of this basis is , with , and its determinant is . ThereforeChanging the sign of one basis vector allows . The numbers , all audible from the spectrum, consequently determine the Gram matrix, and hence , up to an orthogonal transformation. Taking dual lattices gives the same conclusion for . Isospectral flat two-dimensional tori are isometric. The argument uses the special basis property of rank-two Euclidean lattices, so it does not claim higher-dimensional rigidity.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 117 3 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
A useful precise form of the transplantation theorem is as follows. Take congruent copies of a Euclidean tile with labelled flat faces. For each face colour , encode the gluings by a symmetric signed permutation matrix : a glued pair gives off-diagonal entries in the two corresponding positions; an unglued face gives a diagonal entry for a Dirichlet boundary condition, or for a Neumann boundary condition. Corresponding face identifications must use the same maps in the tile coordinates. Suppose two assemblies have matrices and and there is an invertible matrix withThen, for every eigenvalue , is an isomorphism between their Laplacian eigenfunction spaces. The two assemblies are isospectral, including multiplicities.
To see why, pull every tile restriction back to the same Euclidean tile. A boundary value vector and an outward normal derivative vector satisfyAt an internal face these are continuity of the function and equality of oppositely directed derivatives. At a diagonal they impose ; at a diagonal they impose . The intertwining identities preserve both equations, and the Euclidean Laplacian commutes with constant linear combinations of tile functions. The resulting piecewise function is a weak eigenfunction, with the prescribed boundary conditions, and interior elliptic regularity makes it smooth wherever the assembled manifold is smooth. At polygonal corners one uses the usual weak domain of the Dirichlet Laplacian or Neumann Laplacian, rather than assuming smoothness through a corner. The inverse matrix gives the inverse transplantation.
Here is a completely specified propeller pair. Label the seven triangles , with central triangle , and colour the three sides . In the left and right assemblies the internal-edge pairings areEvery pair means reflection of one triangle across the indicated side; the other faces are external boundary. Each assembly has a central triangle and three two-triangle arms. These are the propeller domains. The drawing uses one acute scalene triangle, and each colour always denotes the side opposite the same marked vertex of the starting triangle.
Two seven-triangle propeller domains with the same side-colour gluing rules and different arm orientations
. Details. Let be the ordinary permutation matrices obtained by adding fixed points to the pairings. The following matrix supplies the Neumann boundary condition transplantation:There is a short way to construct and check it. Start with the support in row , and require the support in row to be applied to the support in row . Traversing the six edges of the right-hand tree gives exactly the displayed rows; checking the remaining fixed-point relations verifies for all three colours. Every row has three ones and every two different rows meet in exactly one column, soThe right-hand side has eigenvalues once and six times, proving is invertible, with . Its incidence pattern is that of the Fano plane, which explains the uniform intersections.
For the Dirichlet boundary condition, put . In both assemblies this gives opposite signs to adjacent triangles. Thus their signed face matrices are and : the off-diagonal gluing entries are positive and the unpaired diagonal entries are negative. The matrixthen satisfies and is invertible. The transplantation theorem proves equality of the Dirichlet Laplacian spectra; proves equality of the Neumann Laplacian spectra as well.
Finally vary the three labelled side lengths of the initial triangle in an open region of strict triangle inequalities, with an acute scalene shape sufficiently close to an equilateral triangle. Reflection constructs both domains continuously from these three independent real parameters. At the equilateral configuration the tiles have disjoint interiors. Choose a sufficiently small neighbourhood of that configuration with every triangle angle in . At each central vertex exactly four tile angles meet, forming a sector of angle , while nonincident pieces stay separated. Thus there is an open three-dimensional parameter region in which both assemblies are embedded planar domains.
For a scalene triangle in this region, the three central vertices are exactly the three reflex boundary vertices: their interior angles are , while the other boundary vertices have angles or . Hence a planar isometry of the domains must map the central triangle onto the central triangle. Put those two central triangles in the same position. Their unequal side lengths force any such isometry to fix the central triangle pointwise. Yet the first arm across, for example, side attaches its outer triangle across colour in , and across colour in . These occupy different positions, so the identity does not identify the domains. An intrinsic Riemannian isometry between connected planar domains also restricts locally to a rigid Euclidean motion and hence is one globally. The two propellers are nonisometric throughout this open three-parameter family. Scaling is included as one of the parameters; modulo scaling the family has two parameters.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 117 4 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Let be the orientation-preserving hyperbolic triangle group, acting on the hyperbolic plane with presentationIts quotient is a topological sphere with three cone points of order seven. Define the surjective group homomorphismThe stated order conditions make this well defined, and the generation hypothesis makes it surjective. Set . Every finite-order element of a hyperbolic triangle group is conjugate to a power of a cone-point generator. None of its nontrivial such powers lies in , since all three images have order seven. Therefore is torsion free, and is a closed oriented hyperbolic surface carrying an isometric action of .
The orbifold Euler characteristic of the base isThe covering degree is , so and has genus . The subgroups have order . Point stabilizers for the action are trivial or cyclic of order seven. Since seven does not divide , each acts freely. Thusare smooth closed hyperbolic surfaces, andEquivalently, each is a seven-sheeted orbifold cover of the base with three branch values, and the Riemann-Hurwitz formula gives the same genus.
Gassmann equivalence means that meet each conjugacy class of in the same number of elements. To prove isospectrality directly, let be a Laplacian eigenfunction space on , viewed as a representation of . Pullback identifies with its -invariant subspace. Averaging over is the projection onto this subspace, and henceThe character of a representation in this sum is constant on conjugacy classes. The sums are equal by Gassmann equivalence, so the eigenvalues and their multiplicities agree. This is the mechanism of the Sunada theorem. The constructed genus-three hyperbolic surfaces are isospectral.
Nonconjugacy of in does not prove nonisometry. For example, an isometry of outside the given subgroup might conjugate to and descend to an isometry of the quotients. More generally, an isometry between the quotients lifts to an isometry of conjugating the two groups ; there is no requirement that this lift come from an element of . Additional symmetries of the three-cone-point construction are a possible source of this coincidence.
One can prevent this by modifying the common metric, while keeping the action isometric. Here is a geometric way to make that step precise. On the regular part of the base orbifold , choose a sufficiently small smooth conformal rescaling of a Riemannian metric of its metric whose local geometry distinguishes base points and local directions. One may use a generic smooth conformal factor with separate curvature features on a countable collection of small disks. Let these disks approach the cone points, with amplitudes decaying sufficiently rapidly that the lifted conformal factor and all its derivatives vanish at their centres. This gives smooth metrics on the covering surface, without retaining an open homogeneous region near a cone point. The purpose is to ensure that a local isometry in the regular part covering a quotient is the identity on the base: the curvature features identify its base point and local frame. Pull the metric back to and then descend it to both . The only points with the cone-point rotational symmetry in their metric germs are the lifts of the cone points; the perturbation removes such symmetries in the regular part. Any quotient isometry must therefore preserve this finite distinguished set.
If the perturbed quotients were isometric, their local maps on the dense regular part would preserve the projection to . They would therefore give equivalent connected covers of the punctured base; the correspondence between connected covering spaces and subgroups would conjugate to inside . Applying would conjugate inside , contrary to hypothesis. Thus the perturbed quotients are nonisometric. The same averaging argument still proves isospectrality, because it requires a common -invariant Riemannian metric, not constant curvature. The genus remains three.
This last step produces nonisometric isospectral metrics of variable curvature on genus-three surfaces. An oriented metric defines a Riemann surface through its conformal structure; using a conformal perturbation even preserves the original conformal structures. If “Riemann surface” means specifically its canonical curvature metric, the last step should instead be described as producing Riemannian surfaces. The orbifold has no hyperbolic deformation parameters: uniformizing the perturbed metrics does not preserve their Laplace-Beltrami operator spectra, and cannot be used to claim nonisometric hyperbolic examples from this argument.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 118 1 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Use a radial geometric Kähler potential. Write and . The coefficient Hermitian matrix of isIts eigenvalues are in the complex tangential direction and in the complex radial direction. A Kähler metric is positive precisely when both are positive. The standard form has coefficient matrix , so equality of the Riemannian volume forms is the conditionIndeed, the volume form is and its coefficient is proportional to . Multiplying the determinant equation by gives , so we can takeAn explicit antiderivative isIt is smooth for . Its two eigenvalues areThe form is real and closed because it is of a real function, so it is a Kähler metric on the punctured space. Since , neither eigenvalue equals , and the metric differs from the Euclidean one. The radial and tangential stretches compensate exactly, preserving the volume form:This is a radial Kähler metric with Euclidean volume in complex dimension two.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 126 3 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Hecke operators give a commuting family of arithmetic symmetries of modular forms. They preserve the weight and cusp forms, and diagonalizing them turns the Fourier coefficients of a modular form into multiplicative arithmetic data. Odd weight spaces are zero by the action of ; in weight zero the operators act on constants by . For the substantive theory, fix an even positive weight and , and use the following normalization consistently.
Extend the slash operator for modular forms to byIt is a right action and positive scalar matrices act trivially. Let be the integral matrices of determinant . The determinant-n matrix representatives for Hecke operators for areInteger row operations reduce the first column to , after which a row shear reduces modulo ; uniqueness follows from these same conditions. The Hecke operator isRight multiplication by permutes the left cosets, so is again invariant under the weight- slash operator for modular forms. Each summand is a holomorphic function on the complex upper half-plane, and the coefficient formula below proves holomorphy at a cusp. Thus acts on and preserves . Geometrically, these operators sum over index- sublattices, or equivalently the associated finite-degree correspondences between complex tori; the factors above compensate for the weight's response to lattice scaling.
Write . The sum over is zero unless , in which case it is . Substituting into the displayed definition proves the Fourier coefficients of a composite-index Hecke operator formulawith . In particular, and . At a prime this becomeswhere if .
The Hecke multiplication relations areThey can be checked by applying the coefficient formula twice and regrouping the divisors. More explicitly, coprime indices factor independently, so if . At a prime, separating the terms in the divisor sum according to whether one more factor is available givesIteration gives ; combining the prime factors gives the full relation. Hence all Hecke operators commute, , and the Hecke algebra of modular forms is generated by the together with scalars.
The Petersson inner product on the finite-dimensional cusp form space isThe integrand is invariant and the integral converges because cusp forms decay exponentially at the cusp. The Hecke operators are self-adjoint for the Petersson inner product at level one. To see the underlying adjoint calculation, unfold the finite correspondence for a determinant- matrix and change variable . The invariant hyperbolic measure and the determinant-normalized slash factors transfer from one side of the inner product to . Scalar matrices act trivially, so one can replace by the integral adjugate , which again has determinant . This reverses the correspondence and permutes the same collection of terms, with the same real prefactor . Summing givesCommuting self-adjoint operators on a finite-dimensional inner product space admit a common orthonormal basis of eigenvectors. Thus has a basis of simultaneous Hecke eigenforms, with real eigenvalues.
A nonzero simultaneous cuspidal Hecke eigenform has : if and , comparison of the first coefficients gives for every , so . Normalize . ThenConsequently the full Fourier series is determined by the eigenvalues, and a simultaneous eigenvalue system has a one-dimensional eigenspace. The Hecke multiplication relations translate intoIn particular the coefficients are multiplicative at coprime indices and are determined by the prime coefficients. This is the elementary multiplicity-one statement for normalized level-one Hecke eigenforms.
The Hecke eigenvalues are algebraic integers. One way to explain the arithmetic input is to use the rational structure supplied by the graded ring . The rational cusp form space has a basis with integral Fourier coefficients, for example from appropriate monomials in . Its subgroup of forms whose entire expansions are integral is a full lattice: a finite initial coefficient map is injective by the valence formula for the modular group, so it embeds this subgroup into a finite-rank integer module. The coefficient formula shows that every preserves this lattice, and therefore has a monic integral characteristic polynomial. Its eigenvalues are algebraic integers. Simultaneous diagonalization also makes their number field finite over ; conjugating the rational coefficient data gives another eigenform, whose eigenvalues are again real by self-adjointness. Thus the coefficient field is totally real.
For a normalized cuspidal Hecke eigenform, define its L-function of a cusp form by . The coefficient relations yield the Euler product of a Hecke eigenformIndeed the prime-power recurrence gives , and multiplicativity assembles these factors. These identities hold analytically in an initial right half-plane, as well as formally. For instance boundedness of on the full complex upper half-plane gives , so suffices for absolute convergence.
The Mellin transform of a cusp-form L-function relates this arithmetic to the modular transformation:Splitting at one and using givesExponential cusp decay makes the last integral entire in . This proves the analytic continuation and functional equation of the L-function of a cusp form, complementing its Euler product. The root number is .
Two examples show the scope of the theory. For even , the Eisenstein series is an eigenform with . This follows from its divisor-sum expansion and the same multiplicativity relations; its associated positive-index Dirichlet series is proportional to . The constant coefficient gives , so an eigenbasis of the cusp space together with gives an eigenbasis of the whole modular-form space. The ordinary Petersson inner product above is only used on the cusp space, where it converges. In weight twelve the valence formula for the modular group gives : cancellation of the first coefficients of two independent cusp forms would give a nonzero form with order at infinity at least two, exceeding . Thus the normalized modular discriminant is a Hecke eigenform; writing gives the Ramanujan tau function relations for coprime and .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 126 5 i Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Work initially with , where the nonholomorphic Eisenstein series and its differentiated series converge locally absolutely. For , the identitiesshow that each summand at becomes the summand indexed by at . Reindexing the nonzero integer pairs therefore provesHere and the denominator powers use logarithms of positive real numbers, so there is no ambiguity for complex .
For the nonnegative Laplace-Beltrami operator of the hyperbolic plane, . If with primitive and , choose a matrix in with bottom row . The corresponding summand isThe Laplace-Beltrami operator commutes with hyperbolic isometries, so this summand has eigenvalue . This also covers , or follows there directly. Termwise differentiation now givesThe equation describes an automorphic eigenfunction; it does not assert that this noncuspidal function belongs to the square-integrable discrete spectrum.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 210 4 a Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Write on and on , and put and . Because the two groups have equal size, are orthonormal. Let and . The expected value of the adjacency matrix of a graph is . ConsequentlyBoth displayed eigenvalues are positive under the stated range of , so the first matrix has matrix rank two. The other eigenvalues are zero. The figure shows the within-group and between-group blocks of this balanced stochastic block model; itself has zero diagonal.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 210 4 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
For a symmetric matrix with simple largest eigenvalue and spectral gap , the Davis-Kahan curvature lemma says , where is its leading unit eigenvector. Applying this to a leading eigenvector of , the maximal Rayleigh quotient and duality of the operator norm and trace norm give ; the projector difference has matrix rank at most two. This is a rank-one eigenprojector perturbation bound.
Here has independent centered bounded upper-triangular entries, apart from symmetry. The spectral norm bound for a centered Bernoulli adjacency matrix gives . Taking and therefore gives, for the largest-eigenvalue estimator,The printed argmin selects the wrong end of the spectrum. For a minimizing unit eigenvector , compare its Rayleigh quotient with any unit vector orthogonal to . This yields , and hence . Its mean projector error is at least , using . Along with sufficiently large even , the printed parameter restriction holds and this lower bound tends to , contradicting an error of order . Replace argmin by argmax, or negate the entire matrix before minimizing.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 303 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Use dimensionless interaction couplings in the exponent of the Boltzmann weight. In the following formulas denote the physical interaction energies divided by if that factor has not already been absorbed into the displayed Hamiltonian. This convention is required for temperature-independent numerical fixed-point coordinates.
Split the original square lattice into retained sites with even and eliminated sites with odd , where coordinates are in units of . Every nearest-neighbour bond joins to , whereas a diagonal next-nearest-neighbour bond stays within one sublattice. Denote retained Ising spins by and eliminated Ising spins by . For fixed retained Ising spins defineThe blocked Boltzmann weight in the checkerboard decimation of the square-lattice Ising model isUse the independent uniform product measure on Ising spins on to perform a cumulant expansion. Its one-spin mean vanishes, and . Consequently the first-order term, the first-order eliminated-sublattice term, and the mixed term vanish. To the requested order,Here the truncation keeps and the linear term in ; equivalently count as order . At higher orders the interaction family will generally not close.
Each eliminated site has four retained neighbours, soIts six distinct neighbour pairs comprise four corner pairs at distance and two opposite pairs at distance . A given retained diagonal pair shares two eliminated centres; a given opposite pair shares only one. Thus the generated pair couplings are for diagonal pairs and for axial pairs separated by two original spacings. The original interaction directly contributes to each retained diagonal pair. No single-spin term survives spin inversion symmetry, and no three-spin or four-spin term is present in this second cumulant. This proves closure on exactly two nonconstant interactions at the retained order.
The primitive vectors of the retained square lattice are and . Rotate the axes by degrees and rescale lengths by ; retained diagonal pairs become nearest neighbours, and the axial distance- pairs become next-nearest neighbours. With , the leading checkerboard Ising decimation recursion is thereforeThe constant part of the weight is also determined: , so the original partition function equalsto the same order in the logarithm of the weights. That normalization changes free energy but not the retained-spin interaction operators. If physical energy couplings are kept instead, at fixed the relations read and .
Two shared eliminated neighbours generate a nearest-neighbour bond; one generates a next-nearest-neighbour bond after checkerboard decimation
. Details. The fixed-point equations are and . Their only finite real solutions areThe origin is the high-temperature fixed point; its Jacobian matrix is , with both multipliers zero. The nontrivial candidate critical point is . Linearize the discrete renormalization-group transformation there:The characteristic polynomial is , givingEigenvectors may be chosen as . The positive eigenvalue greater than one is the relevant direction of a fixed point; the other is irrelevant because its magnitude is less than one. Its negative sign only alternates the sign of the perturbation between steps. For a discrete map the magnitude relative to one decides relevance, not the sign rule used for continuous beta-function eigenvalues.
Let be the relevant thermal scaling coordinate, so to first order. A correlation length measured in restored lattice units satisfies . If , then . Hence the thermal exponent from a discrete renormalization map isThis is the value predicted by the stated low-order real-space renormalization group, whose nontrivial fixed point is evaluated beyond the strictly infinitesimal-coupling limit. It is an approximation, not an exact solution of the full square-lattice Ising model.



