Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2014 iii Paper 79 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-07
There is a minor range issue in the printed bound: for and positive , the upper bound is below one. We prove the intended result for ; a valid formulation for every replaces the upper bound by . In fact the argument below gives . All auxiliary estimates are proved here.
For , let , and use the Fejér kernelExpanding the square proves the identity and nonnegativity. The finite geometric series formula and give off the integers. In particular whenever .
Suppose, for a contradiction, that no has . Summing the Fejér kernel along the quadratic sequence and separating its constant term givesThe coefficients on the right sum to . Also . Hence some has , where .
We need only an elementary Van der Corput inequality for finite scalar sequences. For , extended by zero outside , each term of occurs in exactly windows of length . Applying the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality to the window sums and expanding their squares gives, for ,Consequently . Take . If , some must have ; otherwise the displayed upper bound is less than .
For the large quadratic exponential sum just found, put . Its quadratic exponential sum has multiplicative derivativeThus is a finite geometric series. Its absolute value is at most , unless that distance is zero, in which case the desired estimate is automatic. It follows thatSet . The distance to the nearest integer satisfies for a positive integer , by multiplying a nearest integer to . ThereforeThis proves the needed quantitative quadratic recurrence once is chosen polynomially in .
For explicit bookkeeping, and . Choose . For we have and , while . Hence and , contradicting our supposition. The estimates have substantial slack even at .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2014 iii Paper 79 3 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-07
We will prove a polynomial progression in a high-energy fourfold difference set. The route is to extract a large subset with a small difference set, construct a dense Freiman s-isomorphism model, and use the Bogolyubov lemma and the pigeonhole principle. To respect the proof requirement, every ingredient beyond the elementary rules for Freiman homomorphisms is established below.
Assume . Since three entries of an additive quadruple determine the fourth, , so a nonvacuous hypothesis has . Let . Then and . Define the popular sum set . The contribution to additive energy from its complement is at most . Since , the bipartite graph on two copies of whose edges have sums in has at least edges. Moreover .
Put and . Here is a dependent random choice argument producing the small difference set. Independently choose two right vertices, allowing repetition, and let be their common left neighbourhood. The Cauchy-Schwarz inequality gives . Call an ordered pair of left vertices bad if its common right neighbourhood has fewer than elements. The expected number of bad ordered pairs in is at most , because a fixed bad pair survives both random choices with probability at most . ThusChoose a realization attaining at least this expectation. Then , and . Remove from every vertex having more than bad partners in . At most vertices are removed. The remaining set has , and any have at least vertices for which both and are good.
For such a , there are at least right vertices adjacent to , and at least right vertices adjacent to . These paths givea representation with four members of . For fixed , the tuple of four sums determines uniquely, so there are at least distinct tuples. Select one ordered pair for each member of . Tuples belonging to different differences are disjoint. Counting all possible tuples in provesIn particular, with , we have and for . This is the required small-difference set form of the Balog-Szemerédi-Gowers theorem, proved by counting paths rather than cited.
We next control higher iterated sumsets. Choose a nonempty minimizing , so . We prove the Petridis minimal-growth lemma in the form for finite . Order , and let consist of those for which is new in the union of the translates . Then . Every member of already occurs in an earlier translate of . By minimality, , also when the complement is empty. Thus the new contribution from is at most . Sum over to prove the lemma. Iterating with gives .
For completeness, the Ruzsa triangle inequality in the needed form isFor each , fix . The map is injective: adding the coordinates recovers , and then . Take , , and apply the preceding bounds. We obtain the Plünnecke-Ruzsa inequalityIn particular has at most elements.
We now prove a slightly wasteful version of the Ruzsa modeling lemma, avoiding any assumption about the diameter of . Set . Choose a prime larger than all , , and much larger than . Arbitrarily large primes exist by the elementary argument that a prime divisor of one plus the product of all primes up to a given bound exceeds that bound. For a uniformly chosen nonzero multiplier modulo , each nonzero has uniform among the nonzero residues. Call a multiplier forbidden if some such agrees modulo with , where . There are at most such residues. For , a union bound therefore makes the probability of being forbidden less thanChoose a nonforbidden . Represent by integers in and partition that interval into sixteen consecutive pieces of diameter less than . One piece contains the images of a subset with . Let be the integer representative of in that piece, reduced modulo .
A difference of eight sums of these representatives has absolute value less than . If its original difference in is zero, it is a multiple of , hence zero. Conversely, if its reduction modulo is zero, it equals with ; our choice of forces its original difference to be zero. This proves that is a Freiman s-isomorphism of order eight. Injectivity follows by padding a one-term equality to eight terms with a fixed element. Consequently has subset densityNo primality of is needed.
Here is the cyclic Bogolyubov lemma with all its Fourier analysis on a finite abelian group details. Use , , and normalized convolution on a finite group. A finite geometric series proves orthogonality, and expanding the finite sums proves the Parseval identity on a finite group, Fourier inversion on a finite group, and . For , the nonnegative functionhas support exactly and Fourier coefficients on a finite abelian group . Put . The Parseval identity on a finite group gives . The total fourth moment of the frequencies outside is at most .
If for every , then . The zero frequency contributes with no loss. Separating the large and small frequencies in Fourier inversion on a finite group yieldsThus contains the Bohr set expressed in distance coordinates by . This is consistent with the existing character-distance convention for a Bohr set: here it is enough that each character lies in the corresponding short arc around one.
We finally prove the needed nonwrapping progression in a cyclic Bohr set, including for composite . Write and . Partition the -dimensional unit cube into boxes. The points with coordinates modulo one, , give by the pigeonhole principle an integer with for all . ThenThese points are distinct modulo , since their integer representatives lie between zero and . Their number is at least . For the same argument simply chooses .
The Freiman s-isomorphism induces a bijection : define it on a representation by taking the same two positive and two negative images. Equality of representations uses an order-four relation, and injectivity uses the converse relation. If three consecutive members of satisfy , their preimages satisfy the same equality, since its expansion is an equality of eight-term sums in . Hence the inverse image of is an ordinary arithmetic progression in , with distinct terms.
To remove the multiplicative constant from the length bound, let and . The length just proved is at least , where . Choose so that for , and set . For , two distinct members of give a nonzero , and has length three, at least . For , the singleton suffices. In every nonempty case,with depending only on . If empty sets are permitted, the required length is zero and there is no substantive assertion.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2015 ia Paper 1 1B b Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-06
Put . Since , the finite geometric series giveswhere the second equality multiplies numerator and denominator by . Taking imaginary parts gives the finite trigonometric sumTaking real parts of the same finite geometric series givesThe denominator is nonzero by the restriction on . Equivalently, these finite trigonometric sums are and , respectively.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 324 1 a Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Use the positive-exponent quantum Fourier transform convention . The period of a function here is the least positive translation leaving the function unchanged on the cyclic group . The injective promise means exactly when . In particular : the subgroup of period translations is generated by , and wrapping the argument by preserves its value. This is exact quantum period finding on a finite cyclic group, rather than the truncated, nondividing-period version requiring continued fractions.
Prepare a uniform superposition state in the first quantum register using , and perform a reversible computation of the function into a second quantum register, cleaning its workspace by uncomputation:A quantum measurement in the computational basis of the second quantum register leaves a periodic coset state in the first:For the quantum Fourier transform of this periodic coset state, the finite geometric series vanishes unless the measured label is . On those labels its normalized amplitude is . Thus has the uniform distribution on a finite set on , irrespective of .
Compute the greatest common divisor by the Euclidean algorithm, and set , with . Since ,The exact period recovery from a Fourier sample is therefore certified by testing . Every candidate divides and lies between and , so the injective promise makes that equality equivalent to . This includes , where the test uses input , and , which always succeeds. The test does not assert that an arbitrary equality of function values certifies an arbitrary period; the Fourier-derived divisor restriction is essential.
The concise result isHere is the Euler totient function, with . The totient lower bound from the Mertens product gives for . Each trial uses polynomial time quantum Fourier transforms, function evaluations and Euclidean algorithm arithmetic in . Repeating independent trials gives constant success probability; the herald accepts only correct answers.
The printed asymptotic bound has the wrong direction for this argument. In Big O notation, the stated upper bound on the number of coprime integers supplies no success lower bound and is itself false uniformly: for prime , , not . Likewise the single-trial success need not be , since it tends to one for prime. The meaningful corrected guarantee is the lower bound above. If an upper-bounded success rate is literally required, one may deliberately retain an accepted result with an independent probability proportional to ; this discards useful successes and is unnecessary for efficient recovery.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 324 1 b iii Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Apply the same positive-exponent quantum Fourier transform to each of the two quantum registers. The amplitude at of the coset state isThe finite geometric series is when and zero otherwise. ThereforeThere are allowed pairs, with following the uniform distribution on a finite set. The factor changes the probability amplitudes by phases depending on the output label , but has no effect on their probabilities. Using an inverse rather than forward quantum Fourier transform on both quantum registers gives the same support relation.
A modular inverse of exists precisely when . In that case the discrete logarithm isIt cannot generally be determined from every allowed pair. Put . The supported linear congruence has solutions modulo , and determines only modulo ; gives no information when . For instance and are compatible with both and . One may verify a candidate by modular exponentiation, checking . Repeated discrete-logarithm Fourier sampling finds an invertible with per-trial probability , which has the same totient lower bound from the Mertens product as before. When , the group is trivial and are determined without Fourier samples.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2019 ii Paper 3 11I b Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-03
For , the convention gives . Now suppose and choose a primitive root modulo . The nonzero residues are for , while the term vanishes. HenceThis is a finite geometric series. Since but by Fermat's little theorem, multiplication by the nonzero residue givesThe factor is invertible modulo the prime number , so
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2020 ii Paper 4 10C iii Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-09-29
Applying the transform twice givesBy the finite geometric series, the inner sum over is when and zero otherwise. Thereforewhich is the stated with the label interpreted modulo .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2023 ii Paper 3 34D Solution Created 2026-09-23 Updated 2026-09-25
Let the Bravais lattice have primitive vectors , and putThe reciprocal lattice has the basisThe scalar triple product and cross product identities giveConsequently every satisfies for every lattice point , and conversely these three conditions force the coefficients of in the reciprocal basis to be integers. This proves that the displayed vectors generate .
In the Born approximation, suppose that the crystal potential is the sum of translates of one atomic potential over the finite set of lattice sites. Its Fourier transform at the momentum transfer factors asThus the single-atom scattering amplitude is multiplied by the crystal lattice structure factor . Writingseparates the sum into three finite geometric series. For this givesWhen the are large, a factor has a sharp maximum when . All three factors are therefore simultaneously large precisely when . These are the reciprocal-lattice peaks of a finite crystal.
For the stated Body-centered cubic lattice basis,the reciprocal-basis formula givesEquivalently,The shortest nonzero reciprocal vectors have squared Euclidean norm , so
In elastic scattering, . If and is the angle between and , Euclidean geometry givesThe first possible diffraction peak therefore occurs atas , by the small-angle approximation. This is the elastic Bragg scattering condition for the shortest reciprocal-lattice vector.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2024 iii Paper 207 1 b iii Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-03
If incidence grows exponentially, , substitution in the infectious disease renewal equation gives the discrete Euler-Lotka equationFor on , . The finite geometric series therefore yieldsand consequently
Quadratic exponential sum 2026-10-07
A quadratic exponential sum has a polynomial phase of degree two. Its multiplicative derivative at lag has the linear phase up to a constant factor. This degree reduction lets the Van der Corput inequality for finite scalar sequences reduce its size to estimates for finite geometric series.