Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2006 iii Paper 10 3 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Write . One concrete uniformization uses the image in of the level-two principal congruence subgroupIt acts on the complex upper half-plane by Möbius transformations. Integer matrix entries make the group discrete, and the action is properly discontinuous. There are no nonidentity elliptic stabilizers: an elliptic element would have integer even trace with absolute value less than two, hence trace zero. But then gives , contradicting the evenness of . Thus the quotient is an ordinary Riemann surface, with no orbifold points.
A fundamental region is the ideal quadrilateralIts vertical sides are identified by , and its semicircular sides by . The ideal vertices are ; and represent one puncture, while zero and infinity give two others. Filling these three punctures gives genus zero: the identified quadrilateral has three vertices, two paired edges and one face, so its compactification has Euler characteristic . Its complex compactification is a sphere, and a Möbius transformation puts the punctures at . HenceThis is the thrice-punctured sphere as a modular quotient. Equivalently, the uniformization theorem applied to its universal covering map produces the upper-half-plane model: the sphere cannot cover this noncompact surface, and an entire covering from would contradict Little Picard theorem by omitting both zero and one.
The curvature-minus-one metric is invariant under every real Möbius transformation preserving . Indeed, for determinant-one coefficients,Thus it descends to the hyperbolic metric on . This defines its distance by the infimum of path lengths; a choice of local lift does not affect lengths.
For the Schwarz-Pick lemma, first prove the Schwarz lemma. If is a holomorphic function and , the function extends as a holomorphic function across zero. On its modulus is at most . The maximum modulus principle and yield and . Equality at a nonzero point or in the derivative makes a constant of modulus one, again by the maximum modulus principle, so is a rotation.
For a general holomorphic function , conjugate by the automorphisms of the unit disk , putting and at zero. Applying the proved Schwarz lemma givesThe disk hyperbolic metric is , and its distance is twice the inverse hyperbolic tangent of the displayed pseudohyperbolic distance. Both forms of Schwarz-Pick lemma therefore express metric contraction. Equality in the derivative at one point makes a disk automorphism by the equality case already proved.
For and a holomorphic function , compose with a universal covering map of and lift to a universal covering map of . The simply connected source of the lift is a disk or half-plane. Schwarz-Pick lemma there bounds the lifted metric derivative, and the covering maps are local isometries, soThe second inequality follows by applying the length inequality to every joining path and taking the infimum. The hyperbolic metric on the punctured disk is its own intrinsic metric,obtained from the covering . It is not merely the ordinary disk metric restricted to the punctured disk.
Yes, equality can occur for distinct points. The cyclic subgroup lies in . Its quotient is conformally the punctured disk, using , because this identifies precisely . The subgroup inclusion induces a covering map that is a holomorphic functionIt is a local isometry. Choose a sufficiently small geodesically convex ball around any target point that is evenly covered. Two distinct sufficiently close points in one lift of that ball are joined by the lift of its minimizing target geodesic. The lift has the same length, giving for this pair, while contraction gives the reverse inequality. Thus equality holds.
For context, if the lifted map is not an automorphism, the derivative inequality is strict at every point; integrating along a minimizing geodesic in the complete punctured-disk metric gives a strict distance inequality for every distinct pair. Equality forces the covering-map case, but even a covering map need not preserve all distances globally because shorter paths can pass through other sheets. This is the distinction captured by equality in hyperbolic Schwarz-Pick contraction.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2006 ii Paper 1 12F Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
In curvature-minus-one polar coordinates the hyperbolic metric is . Thus the area element is , givingIt is asymptotic to .
For a usual locally finite tessellation with compact congruent tiles of nonempty interior, let their diameter be at most and choose in each a congruently placed interior ball of radius . These balls have disjoint interiors. The number of tiles meeting a geodesic segment of length one is uniformly bounded: their ball centres lie in a ball of radius , and the disjoint -balls lie in the larger ball of radius . Comparing areas supplies a constant . A path of length , divided into at most such segments, therefore crosses at most tiles. A small generic perturbation avoids vertices if steps are defined by crossing sides.
Consequently the union of tiles at most steps from the initial tile contains a metric ball of radius for fixed . If is tile area, their number is at least , an exponential lower bound. Conversely any chain of adjacent tiles lies in about a point in the initial tile; the interiors are disjoint, so . Thus is bounded above and below by positive exponential functions of . No precise common growth exponent is claimed.
An explicit example is the regular right-angled pentagon tiling : reflect a regular hyperbolic pentagon with all angles in its sides. Four pentagons meet at each vertex, and their interiors tile the plane. Its tiles have area by the hyperbolic polygon area formula. The compactness and ordinary local finiteness assumptions exclude pathological decompositions with degenerate tiles.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2007 iii Paper 11 3 a Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Use the curvature hyperbolic metric . For the disk Möbius transformation , set . The hyperbolic distance satisfiesThe triangle inequality givesThus convergence of the exponential sum is independent of the base point. Taking the base point zero, it is equivalent to the Blaschke condition . This condition implies that only finitely many terms lie in any compact subdisk, including finitely many repetitions of any point.
To construct the required holomorphic function, for define the Blaschke factorFor , writing givesConsequently, after the finitely many factors corresponding to small are removed, the sum of converges uniformly on each compact subdisk. Those factors are uniformly close to one, so their logarithms form an absolutely convergent series there. Their product tail is holomorphic and nonvanishing. Including the finitely many removed factors gives the Blaschke productwith exactly the requested zero multiplicities. Each finite product has modulus at most one in the disk, so the limit does too. Hence maps into the open disk and has exactly the prescribed zeros, proving the implication from the summability condition.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2007 iii Paper 11 3 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Let be the nonzero bounded holomorphic function in the zero-set condition. Choose with and compose with a disk Möbius transformation carrying zero to . Call the resulting function and its zeros , counted with multiplicity. Then and .
For a radius with no zero on its circle, Jensen's formula givesTo see the formula directly, divide by its finitely many interior zero factors. The logarithm of the modulus of the resulting zero-free holomorphic function is harmonic near the closed disk and satisfies the mean value property. The circle average of for is , obtained by expanding . Subtracting its value at zero gives exactly the displayed zero sum.
Let through zero-free circles. Increasing limits of the nonnegative summands giveSince , the Blaschke condition follows for the transformed sequence. The hyperbolic metric identity and the base-point comparison proved above giveThis proves the reverse implication and completes the equivalence.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2007 iii Paper 11 3 Solution 2026-10-14
The Blaschke product here is taken over distinct points of the orbit; its existence is part of the hypothesis. It is not necessary to assert that every discrete orbit satisfies the Blaschke condition.
The modulus of a Blaschke factor is the pseudohyperbolic distance. Thus, away from the orbit,The logarithms converge absolutely at such a point, by the compact convergence estimate for the Blaschke product. Every preserves the hyperbolic metric and permutes the orbit. Reindexing this convergent product yields .
The functions and have the same simple zero set, since is a biholomorphism. Their quotient therefore extends holomorphically and without zeros across the orbit. It has modulus one everywhere. The open mapping theorem makes it a constant, denoted . FinallySince is not identically zero, cancellation givesThis is the automorphy character of an orbit Blaschke product. The equal-modulus argument is essential: equality of zero sets alone would not make the quotient of two bounded holomorphic functions constant.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2007 iii Paper 20 4 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Let . Since and the scalar centre is trivial,Choose to stabilize a nonzero vector and to stabilize a two-dimensional subspace. There are seven choices of either object, so both subgroups have index and order .
Their coset permutation characters agree. The number of nonzero vectors fixed by is . A two-dimensional subspace is the kernel of a unique nonzero covector, so its stabilizer action is the dual action . Its fixed-point count isusing equality of the matrix ranks of a matrix and its transpose. For a subgroup , counting the representatives of fixed cosets givesThus the equal characters and subgroup orders give equal intersection counts with every conjugacy class. This proves are Gassmann equivalent.
They are not conjugate. For example, the stabilizer of contains every matrix with and . An invariant plane containing would give an invariant line in , impossible for the full action. An invariant plane not containing would be a complement to that line, but the arbitrary shears do not preserve any such complement. Hence a point stabilizer preserves no plane, whereas every conjugate of does. The two subgroups are nonconjugate.
We now use a cone-torus construction of genus-four Sunada surfaces. Let be a hyperbolic torus with one cone point of angle . Its orbifold fundamental group has presentationMap to the supplied generators of . Their commutator has exact order , so this gives a surjection with torsion-free kernel : every finite-order element of is conjugate to a power of the cone generator, and no nonidentity such power lies in . Thus is a smooth closed hyperbolic surface with a -action. Its quotients by are smooth too, since order- subgroups contain no element of order and therefore meet no cone stabilizer.
The orbifold Euler characteristic of is . Each quotient cover has degree , soThe Sunada theorem proved in Question 3 makes isospectral for every choice of the base hyperbolic metric.
Here is an explicit supply of base metrics. A hyperbolic trirectangle has three right angles and a fourth angle . If its sides adjacent to the opposite right-angle vertex have lengths , the trirectangle identity is . Thus varies freely, with . Reflecting four copies about their two perpendicular centre lines gives a quadrilateral with four angles and opposite sides of equal length. Identifying opposite sides produces a cone torus: all four corners give total angle . Its two centre-line geodesics intersect once and have lengths . Cut along the shorter chosen geodesic and reglue with a small twist ; this retains the cone angle and allows an additional metric parameter. The remaining cut surface has two equal-length geodesic boundaries and the cone point.
We give a concrete intersection test for nonisometric finite covers, rather than relying on subgroup nonconjugacy alone. Choose sufficiently small. The trirectangle geometry gives an embedded collar of width about . The shortest perpendicular joining the two boundary components after cutting has length . At zero twist it closes to , the unique shortest closed geodesic crossing once. Uniqueness follows from uniqueness of the shortest perpendicular; all other once-crossing classes have a positive length gap, since only finitely many closed geodesics have bounded length. For sufficiently small twists, the same marked class remains the unique shortest once-crossing geodesic. A geodesic crossing at least twice traverses the collar at least twice, so for small its length is greater than .
Geodesics disjoint from remain entirely in the cut surface and have twist-independent lengths. In a bounded window around they supply only finitely many possible length values, including lengths of iterates. Meanwhile varies nontrivially with by the hyperbolic seam identity: its hyperbolic cosine has a positive multiple of . Choose a small twist away from those finitely many coincidences. Then the only base geodesic of length is , up to orientation. By taking smaller if necessary, the only base geodesics of length at most are powers of : those crossing are long, and the nonperipheral geodesics of the limiting two-cusped cone pair of pants have lengths bounded away from zero.
In each cover, primitive lift components of a base geodesic are indexed by cycles of its monodromy permutation, with length equal to the cycle size times its base length. The permutation of has a unique singleton in each action, so each has a uniquely length-identified primitive lift of length . The permutation of has one two-cycle: it is for and for . Hence each has a unique primitive lift of length ; the iterate of the singleton lift is not primitive. At the single base intersection of , intersections of their lifted components are exactly their common sheet labels. ThereforeAn isometry would have to preserve the uniquely identified primitive lengths and their geometric intersection numbers. This contradiction proves that and are not isometric, even allowing orientation reversal.
Finally, let range over a sufficiently small positive interval, choosing a permissible twist for each value. The singleton cycle of makes the hyperbolic systole of each cover equal to . Distinct values therefore give distinct isometry classes. We obtain uncountably many pairs of nonisometric, isospectral genus-four Riemann surfaces.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2007 iii Paper 20 5 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Throughout the hyperbolic discussion take curvature and . A Y-piece is a pair of pants with a hyperbolic metric and three geodesic boundary components. Three labelled positive boundary lengths determine it up to isometry. To see existence and uniqueness, cut along the three shortest perpendicular seams. The two resulting right-angled hyperbolic hexagons have alternating side lengths , which determine each hexagon. Conversely, any three positive alternating lengths produce such a hexagon, and doubling along the other sides produces the desired Y-piece. In particular the seam opposite satisfies
An X-piece is a four-holed hyperbolic sphere with geodesic boundaries, obtained by joining two Y-pieces along one pair of equal-length boundaries. For a chosen separating curve, it is determined bywhere is the common gluing length and is the relative arclength twist, measured between chosen seam endpoints. The identification reverses boundary orientation so that the surface is oriented. For an unmarked gluing, is periodic modulo ; a marking retains , because a full Dehn twist changes the marking. These six parameters describe the X-piece with its chosen separating curve; different curve choices or boundary symmetries can describe the same unmarked surface.
Choose a pants decomposition of a closed oriented genus- surface. Each Y-piece has Euler characteristic , and gluing boundary circles does not change the total Euler characteristic. Thus there are pieces. Their boundary circles are paired, giving gluing curves. Choose their disjoint geodesic representatives, then prescribe each cuff length and its relative twist. The Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates areThey determine the marked hyperbolic surface and hence its unmarked isometry class, with real parameters. One must also fix the combinatorial gluing pattern of the chosen pants decomposition. Full twists and other changes of marking identify some parameter sets in unmarked moduli space of Riemann surfaces. The genus restriction matters: a sphere and a torus do not admit a closed curvature- metric or such a decomposition into geodesic Y-pieces.
For a fixed oriented topological surface , Teichmüller space consists of marked Riemann surfaces . Two markings represent the same point when a conformal isomorphism between the surfaces carries one marking to the other up to homotopy. By the uniformization theorem, for these are equivalently marked curvature- metrics. The displayed Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates identify with a cell of real dimension ; the mapping class group quotient gives the unmarked moduli space of Riemann surfaces.
The spectral version of the Wolpert generic spectral rigidity theorem says that outside a closed proper real-analytic exceptional subset of , the Laplace spectrum determines the hyperbolic surface up to isometry. The exceptional subset has positive codimension and is invariant under changes of marking. Orientation reversal must be allowed, since the Laplacian cannot detect orientation. Equivalently, a generic surface is determined by its unmarked length spectrum, counted with multiplicities. This is a generic uniqueness statement, not a claim that every isospectral pair is isometric; the construction in Question 4 lies in the exceptional locus.
Three major ingredients and their roles are as follows.
- The Selberg trace formula converts the Laplacian spectrum into the lengths and multiplicities of closed geodesics, and conversely. It moves the problem from eigenvalues to geometric length data, where pants and twists can be used.
- Finite length coordinates for hyperbolic surfaces and real-analytic length functions reduce candidate spectral matchings to finitely many local analytic systems. The cuff lengths fix the Y-pieces; two transverse curves at each cuff fix its twist, giving labelled length functions. Hyperbolic holonomy gives , so these lengths obey analytic trace relations. Discreteness of bounded length data, compactness in the thick part, and finite determination of those trace relations control the locally possible unlabelled matchings. A matching that is not an identity therefore lies in a proper analytic zero set.
- Geometric decoding of the persistent identities uses the collar lemma and variations of Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates. Pinching a cuff makes crossing curves long while disjoint ones remain bounded; twisting controls the transverse length relations. These behaviours recover the pants incidence and the twist data, and show that a matching persisting on an open parameter set comes from a change of marking, possibly with orientation reversal. Thus any genuinely nonisometric matching is confined to the lower-dimensional exceptional analytic locus.
For completeness, a related finiteness statement sometimes grouped with this theorem is that a fixed closed hyperbolic surface has only finitely many isospectral isometry classes. Its short proof uses three particularly concrete tools: a common discrete length spectrum; Mumford's compactness theorem, applied to the common positive systole; and finitely many determining marked lengths. Compactness would give an accumulation point if an isospectral family were infinite. Nearby markings make each determining length converge, while discreteness of the fixed spectrum makes it eventually constant. The determining lengths then force eventual equality of the marked surfaces, a contradiction. This finiteness of isospectral hyperbolic surfaces statement does not replace the stronger generic uniqueness assertion above.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 20 5 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
A Riemann surface is a connected one-complex-dimensional complex manifold: it has local complex coordinates with holomorphic transition maps. These coordinates induce an orientation and a conformal structure. Fix a closed oriented topological surface of genus . A point of Teichmüller space is a marked Riemann surface , where is an orientation-preserving marking. Two pairs are equivalent if there is a biholomorphism with isotopic to . Thus the marking remembers how curves on the reference surface sit in ; forgetting it gives the moduli space of Riemann surfaces, obtained by quotienting by the mapping class group.
For , the uniformization theorem supplies a unique curvature- hyperbolic metric in each conformal class. A pants decomposition has cuffs, and their positive lengths together with their real twists give Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates. HenceFor completeness, is a point, whereas is the upper half-plane, parametrizing marked complex tori with .
The Wolpert generic spectral rigidity theorem says that, for fixed , there is a closed proper real-analytic exceptional subset of such that a hyperbolic surface outside that subset is determined up to isometry by its unmarked length spectrum, equivalently its Laplacian spectrum. This is an unoriented isometry statement: reversing orientation cannot be detected by either spectrum.
The Huber spectral equivalence theorem says that two closed curvature- hyperbolic surfaces have the same Laplacian spectrum, with multiplicities, if and only if they have the same unmarked length spectrum, with multiplicities. One may consistently count unoriented closed geodesics including their iterates; alternatively, the primitive multiset determines the multiset with iterates and conversely. This equivalence comes from the Selberg trace formula.
The Buser finite length spectrum theorem is the finite-determination ingredient: for each and there is a finite number such that, for any two closed hyperbolic surfaces of genus with hyperbolic systole at least , equality of their length multisets through implies equality of their entire length spectra. The finite-length statement is used in Buser's chapter on Wolpert's theorem. It determines the full spectrum, not necessarily the isometry class.
Here is a proof of the Buser finite length spectrum theorem through finite spectral matching by polynomial invariants. We use the following subsidiary results, stating the required content. First, Mumford's compactness theorem makes the part of the genus- moduli space of Riemann surfaces with hyperbolic systole at least compact. Second, marked hyperbolic holonomy representations of a closed oriented surface lift from to , and normalized representatives can be chosen continuously on sufficiently small parameter charts. Their hyperbolic translation length satisfiesThird, the length spectrum of a compact hyperbolic surface is locally finite, and metrics on compact marked parameter charts are uniformly bilipschitz equivalent. Finally, the Hilbert basis theorem implies that a descending sequence of algebraic sets in a finite-dimensional affine space stabilizes. These are compactness, holonomy, elementary geometric finiteness and algebraic finiteness results; none is the finite unmarked-spectrum assertion we are proving.
By compactness, finitely many relatively compact marked charts cover the thick moduli space of Riemann surfaces. Choose normalized lifted hyperbolic holonomy representations on these charts and take their compact closures. Their finite union is a compact set of determinant-one matrix tuples representing every surface in the thick part, possibly more than once. Each tuple records the images of the generators of the fundamental group. Thus sits in a fixed finite-dimensional real matrix space. Every group word is a polynomial in these matrix entries: multiplication is polynomial, and for a determinant-one two-by-two matrix its inverse is its adjugate, also polynomial. Consequently each is a polynomial on the ambient space. Squared traces remove the sign ambiguity of the lift, and is strictly increasing for positive .
Enumerate the unoriented nontrivial free homotopy classes as , including the iterates, and write for their geodesic lengths at . The uniform finiteness of short geodesic classes follows here directly: on each of the finitely many compact marked charts, choose a fixed reference metric and a uniform bilipschitz constant . A class with somewhere on that chart has reference length at most . Only finitely many classes have that reference length, and a finite union of these finite collections is finite. In particular, for every the candidate setis finite. If two parameters in have equal lengths for classes , then . These candidate sets depend on the fixed compact set and the source label , not on the number of labels currently being matched.
For every , define in the full ambient space of pairs of matrix tuples as follows. Require an injective choice with andand independently require an injective choice with andThere are finitely many possible pairs of choices because every is finite. For each choice these are finitely many polynomial equations. Therefore is a finite union of algebraic sets, hence an algebraic set. Restricting an injective matching to its first entries provesThe Hilbert basis theorem now supplies such that for all . This step takes place in a fixed affine space and uses polynomial equations, so it gives stabilization of the actual sets, not just stabilization of germs at individual parameters.
For , stabilization gives injective partial length matchings in both directions for every . Fix any length . Only finitely many labels have length at or at , by local finiteness. Take large enough to contain every such label at . Its injective matching into the labels at preserves , and hence preserves length, so the multiplicity of at is at most its multiplicity at . The reverse matching gives the opposite inequality. Thus the two multiplicities are equal for every , proving equality of the entire unmarked length spectra. No assumed global matching or unjustified exchange of infinitely many neighborhoods is needed.
Finally choose a numberSuppose the two length multisets agree through . For each of the first labels at , select a distinct equal-length label at , which is possible precisely because the truncated multisets agree with multiplicity. Each selected label belongs to the corresponding . Do the same in the reverse direction. Then , and the previous paragraph proves equality of the full length spectra. Since was selected using only the fixed thick genus- parameter space, the resulting finite depends only on . This proveswith each intersection interpreted as a multiset. By the Huber spectral equivalence theorem, the corresponding entire Laplacian spectra also agree. This is the finite matching reduction needed before the analytic and geometric rigidity steps in the Wolpert generic spectral rigidity theorem.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 ii Paper 4 3G Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
On the unit three-ball , the distance in the Poincare ball model is the infimum of the lengthsover piecewise smooth paths joining the two points. Equivalently the hyperbolic metric as a metric-space distance isIt has curvature-minus-one normalization; in particular .
For a nonempty finite set , define . The triangle inequality gives , so is continuous. Take . Any improving center satisfies , and thus lies in the closed hyperbolic ball .
This ball is compact: an isometry sending to the origin identifies it with the Euclidean closed ball of radius , and the Euclidean and hyperbolic topologies agree inside . The continuous function attains a minimum on . Centers outside have , so this is also the global minimum. Its associated closed ball proves a minimum enclosing ball in hyperbolic space exists. For the empty finite set, any center and radius zero suffice.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 iii Paper 11 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Zeros are counted with their prescribed finite multiplicities, and the function is not identically zero. The criterion for zero sets in the unit disc is local finiteness: no point of the disc is an accumulation point of the zero sequence, and no point has infinite multiplicity. Necessity follows from the identity theorem for holomorphic functions. For sufficiency, factor a finite number of zeros at zero as . For an infinite sequence of remaining zeros , local finiteness implies . With Weierstrass elementary factorsuse . On each compact subdisc, eventually and the logarithm of the tail factor is , bounded in modulus by . These bounds are summable, so infinite product convergence from logarithmic tails gives locally uniform convergence and nonvanishing away from the listed zeros. Its finite initial factors give exactly their multiplicities. For a finite sequence an ordinary polynomial suffices.
Use the curvature-minus-one hyperbolic metric, with length element . Integrating radially givesTherefore the printed sum condition is equivalent to the Blaschke condition .
To prove necessity for bounded , first suppose and choose a radius with no zero on its circle. Remove the finitely many factors for . The logarithm of the modulus of the remaining zero-free function is harmonic on the closed disc. Its mean value property, together with the mean of being for (expand the logarithm in powers of ), proves Jensen's formulaLet through such radii. Each summand increases to , and for by integration of . Consequently . If has order at zero, apply the argument to , which is still bounded: outside it is bounded by , and inside use the maximum modulus principle. Add the finite contribution of the zeros at zero.
For sufficiency use a Blaschke product. For its normalized Blaschke factor isOn , . The Blaschke condition thus makes the product converge locally uniformly; outside the specified zeros, the tail logarithms converge absolutely and the product is nonzero. Each factor has modulus at most one in the disc, so the limit is bounded by one. A factor supplies any finite multiplicity at zero. This proves
For any point not among the zeros, the pseudohyperbolic distance formula givesApply the proved inequality with to obtain . Sum over finite products and pass to the limit, including factors at zero. This givesThe sum is finite: the triangle inequality gives . If is itself a zero, and the same bound is immediate, so no substitution at the excluded value is needed. A unimodular constant in has no effect.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 iii Paper 11 5 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Represent a transformation byMultiplication preserves this form and determinant, and the inverse has the same form with parameters . To check the congruence condition, complex conjugation is the identity modulo . Thus says exactly that fixes the column modulo two. Products and inverses preserve this property. The identity belongs to the set, and changing the common sign of does not change either the transformation or its congruence. Hence these transformations form a group.
Because , the denominator has no zero in the disc. Direct calculation givesThe inverse also maps the disc into itself, so is a disc automorphism, and these identities show that it preserves the hyperbolic metric .
The action is properly discontinuous. If is compact, put . If , choose with . ThenSince and , its distance bound gives and therefore . There are only finitely many Gaussian integers with these bounds, so only finitely many satisfy . This proves the required properly discontinuous group action directly.
If , then and is one of the Gaussian units . The congruence leaves only . Both give the identity transformation. Thus the point stabilizer of zero is trivial.
The closed Dirichlet region centered at zero is the set of with for every . For a nonidentity element, . WriteThe distance inequality is equivalent, by pseudohyperbolic distance, to . Squaring and subtracting yieldsSince and , the bisector half-plane is exactlyFor or and or , all the group conditions hold and the products are the four numbers , with . Their four inequalities forceConversely, for any group element . As are integers, . Thus every point satisfying those four inequalities satisfies every other one:This proves, with no missing bisectors, the Gaussian-integer disc group with an ideal-square Dirichlet domain formulaEquivalently it is the part of the unit disc outside all four open circles of radius one centered at . Its sides are the inward arcs of those circles. They meet the unit circle orthogonally, and their ideal vertices are ; these vertices themselves lie outside the open disc.
The origin has trivial point stabilizer and the group orbit is locally finite by the discontinuity proof, so this closed bisector intersection has translates covering the disc with disjoint interiors, as in the definition of a Dirichlet domain. Side identifications are allowed on its boundary.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2010 iii Paper 19 5 Solution 2026-10-14
Sunada's theorem states that if a finite group acts isometrically on a closed Riemannian manifold , and two Gassmann equivalent subgroups act freely, then and are isospectral for the function Laplace-Beltrami operator. Gassmann equivalence means for every conjugacy class of . For each Laplace-Beltrami operator eigenspace , its invariant subspace has dimensionThe character of a representation is a class function, so the two multiplicities agree. A necessary condition for nonisometry is that the subgroups are not conjugate in : conjugation by an ambient deck transformation would induce an isometry. This is not sufficient when the common covering has additional geometric symmetries.
Use the oriented hyperbolic triangle groupand the epimorphism given by , . Its base orbifold is the doubled hyperbolic triangle with angles , having signature . Let and .
The groups are torsion free. Indeed, torsion elements in an oriented triangle group are conjugate to nontrivial powers of its three vertex rotations. Such powers map either to elements of order three, which cannot lie in a subgroup of order , or to the order-two cube . The latter is central and absent from both , so it is absent from every conjugate as well. Thus the degree-twelve orbifold coversare smooth, closed, connected orientable surfaces. The common cover is smooth too; act freely on it. Orbifold Euler characteristic givesFor example, this formula follows by triangulating the base and weighting a vertex of order by before multiplying by the cover degree. Equivalently, each doubled triangle has hyperbolic area , so has area and Gauss-Bonnet theorem gives the same genus.
There is one extra issue in obtaining the same hyperbolic limit on a single marked surface: the two limiting hyperbolic covers must themselves be isometric. Nonconjugacy and the displayed element orders alone do not prove this. An explicit realization of the supplied example resolves the issue. The group seed is recorded in the original genus-two construction; the following coset actions and reflection identities give a direct verification. Label the twelve sheets so that the two right-coset actions of areThese are concrete permutation data for an order- realization with the required two subgroups. The permutationsatisfies, by direct substitution,Reflection of the doubled triangle reverses both vertex rotations. Apply this reflection on every fundamental domain and relabel sheets by . The two identities ensure that identified edges go to identified edges, so this descends to a hyperbolic isometry . Fix , let be its hyperbolic metric, and use to mark by the same smooth surface. Thus both pulled-back limiting Riemannian metrics are exactly . The explicit reversed-action check is what makes the common limit justified, rather than treating it as a consequence of Sunada's theorem.
Choose smooth orbifold Riemannian metrics on the base converging to its hyperbolic metric , with no nonidentity local isometry on the regular part. The density assertion in Sunada's local isometry lemma applies in orbifold charts as well: use equivariant perturbations at the finitely many cone points and ordinary local perturbations elsewhere. Smoothness here is orbifold smoothness, so the lifted Riemannian metrics on and the two smooth covers are ordinary smooth Riemannian metrics. Such choices can be made in successively smaller smooth neighbourhoods of ; cone orders and the topological coverings stay fixed.
For area separation of convergent Sunada families, adjust each by a constant positive factor so thatExplicitly, multiply the initially chosen Riemannian metric by the ratio of the desired area to its actual area. In dimension two this ratio is exactly the area multiplier. The ratios tend to one, so smooth convergence persists, and constant scaling preserves the absence of local isometries. Lift these adjusted Riemannian metrics to and pull them back by the fixed markings to obtain , for . The three required properties follow below.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2013 iii Paper 16 5 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-07
Use the unique curvature hyperbolic metric on a closed Riemann surface of genus , supplied by the uniformization theorem. This is the implicit setting for the partition and spectral theorems; a genus-zero or genus-one surface does not have this hyperbolic metric.
A partition is a pants decomposition by disjoint essential simple closed geodesics, whose complement is a union of pairs of pants. A pair of pants is a sphere with three disks removed, furnished here with geodesic boundary. Its Euler characteristic is , so there must be pants. Every pant has three boundaries and every cutting curve occurs twice, giving cutting curves. The Bers pants decomposition theorem asserts that a constant depending only on bounds the lengths of all cuffs in some such pants decomposition of every closed genus- hyperbolic surface.
To see what geometry the cuffs determine, cut each pair of pants along its three perpendicular seams into two congruent right-angled hyperbolic hexagons. The three alternate sides are , where the are its boundary lengths. The right-angled hyperbolic hexagon identity determines the seam opposite the half-cuff byWe use the standard existence and uniqueness theorem for a right-angled hyperbolic hexagon with prescribed positive alternating side lengths. Thus the three boundary lengths determine the pair of pants up to isometry.
Fix a topological pants decomposition, label its cuffs, and choose reference seam endpoints and orientations. Gluing two boundaries of the same length requires a translation along that boundary; its signed distance is a twist . The gluing graph, the positive cuff lengths, and the twists therefore determine the unmarked hyperbolic surface up to isometry. A full boundary translation has period , so for an unmarked gluing one may take , with endpoints identified. For a marked surface the whole real twist records the number of Dehn twists, and the Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates areThe topological gluing data are necessary when the decomposition is not fixed. Different markings or decomposition graphs can describe the same unmarked surface.
Teichmüller space consists of pairs , where is a closed genus- Riemann surface and is an orientation-preserving marking, modulo the equivalence when a conformal orientation-preserving map has homotopic to . The Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates identify it with , of real dimension . The moduli space of Riemann surfaces forgets the marking by quotienting by the mapping class group.
The Wolpert generic spectral rigidity theorem says that the locus of closed genus- hyperbolic surfaces possessing an isospectral but nonisometric partner lies in a locally real-analytic exceptional locus of lower dimension in Teichmüller space. Thus a generic surface is determined, up to isometry, by its unmarked length spectrum, equivalently by its Laplacian spectrum. Here an isometry may reverse orientation; the length spectrum cannot distinguish the two orientations of the same metric. The equivalence of the two spectra is the compact hyperbolic Selberg trace formula.
The simplifying result is the Buser finite length spectrum theorem: for every and there is such that two closed genus- hyperbolic surfaces with hyperbolic systoles at least have the same entire unmarked length spectrum if their length multisets up to agree. Multiplicities are included. We will count primitive unoriented closed geodesics; counting all iterates is equivalent by successively removing shorter iterates. The theorem is uniform on the thick part of moduli space, not merely a cutoff chosen separately for a particular pair.
Here is a proof using compactness and polynomial trace equations. We state the subsidiary facts and explain their role. First, Mumford's compactness theorem makes the genus- thick moduli space compact. It can also be seen from the Bers pants decomposition theorem: cuffs in a Bers decomposition lie in , there are finitely many pants decomposition graphs, and unmarked twists may be reduced modulo their cuff lengths. These data lie in finitely many compact boxes of Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates and cover the thick moduli space.
Second, these finite compact boxes give a compact family of marked hyperbolic structures on a fixed smooth surface representing every member of the thick moduli space. We use the standard smooth dependence of the glued metrics and their hyperbolic holonomy representations on Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates. Choose smooth representatives over finitely many parameter neighborhoods and conjugate the hyperbolic holonomy representation using a fixed lifted Riemannian orthonormal frame. Passing to finite compact subboxes gives a compact set of representations, together with a compact family of representative smooth metrics. Changing the markings between boxes causes no problem: all are markings from the same fixed , and the union is finite.
Third, uniformization theorem identifies each marked hyperbolic surface with for a faithful discrete hyperbolic holonomy representation into . We use the standard lifting fact that a closed orientable hyperbolic holonomy representation admits a lift to , and lifts may be chosen continuously on small parameter neighborhoods. Choose lifts on finitely many such neighborhoods, allowing the finitely many possible sign choices. A representation is described by the matrices of standard fundamental group generators. The polynomial encoding of hyperbolic geodesic lengths uses, for each fixed group word , its squared matrix traceis a polynomial in their entries: products are polynomial, and the inverse of a determinant-one matrix is its polynomial adjugate. For a nontrivial hyperbolic word, the hyperbolic translation length obeysThus equality of the positive lengths is exactly equality of these trace polynomials, independent of lift signs.
Fourth, the length spectrum of a closed hyperbolic surface is locally finite with finite multiplicities. We need the uniform finiteness of short geodesic classes across the compact marked family. More uniformly, for each finite , only finitely many unoriented primitive conjugacy classes can have length at most in any metric of . To justify uniformity, compactness of the smooth metrics gives a common bilipschitz equivalence comparison with one fixed metric on . If , the minimizing geodesic has length at most , so . Local finiteness for then gives a finite list. Local finiteness itself follows from proper discontinuity of the cocompact group of the hyperbolic holonomy representation: conjugate a geodesic axis to meet a fixed compact fundamental set, and a bounded-length axis gives a group element moving that compact set a bounded distance, of which there are only finitely many.
Finally, the Hilbert basis theorem says that a polynomial ring in finitely many real variables is Noetherian. Consequently a decreasing sequence of sets cut out by polynomial equations eventually stabilizes. Indeed, their vanishing ideals form an increasing chain and stabilize. Finite unions of such sets are still algebraic: one can take all products of one defining polynomial from each component. This finiteness fact is the engine that turns arbitrarily many spectral comparisons into finitely many.
Enumerate the primitive unoriented conjugacy classes as . For each letand let be the finite set of primitive classes that can have length at most anywhere in . Define in the finite-dimensional space of pairs of generator matrices as follows: it consists of pairs for which there exists an injectionand also an injection satisfying the analogous equations with and interchanged. There are only finitely many injections. Each choice imposes finitely many polynomial equations; taking their finite unions and then intersecting the two directions proves that is a real affine algebraic set. On determinant-one representations these equations are exactly the desired matching of lengths. Defining the polynomials on the ambient matrix-entry space is harmless; the argument will only apply them to representations in .
Put . The sets form a decreasing chain of affine algebraic sets, hence for some ,For representations in , membership in this intersection is equivalent to equality of the full length spectra. One direction follows by matching equal lengths, including their multiplicities. For the other, fix a length . All primitive classes of length on the first surface occur in some finite initial segment. Its injective matching shows that the second surface has at least that multiplicity at ; the reverse injection gives the reverse inequality. Local finiteness makes both multiplicities finite. Doing this for every proves multiset equality.
TakeIf two surfaces in have equal length multisets up to , each initial segment through can be matched injectively on the other surface. Its matching classes lie in , since the matched lengths are at most . The reverse matching is available as well. Thus the pair belongs to , hence to every , and the preceding paragraph yieldsAll choices of the compact family were made using only and , so the resulting cutoff has the asserted dependence. If the thick family is empty the assertion is vacuous. This proves Buser's finite length spectrum theorem without claiming that equal full length spectra always force isometry; exceptional isospectral pairs are compatible with the theorem and are precisely why Wolpert's theorem is a generic statement.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 117 5 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Equip the closed Riemann surface with its uniformizing hyperbolic metric. This assumption matters: arbitrary metrics can have an annular region filled by parallel simple closed geodesics. On a hyperbolic surface, a nontrivial free homotopy class has exactly one closed geodesic, and a contractible closed geodesic cannot exist. Consequently distinct disjoint simple closed geodesics are essential and nonparallel.
Cut along such geodesics. Every component has negative Euler characteristic, since disk and annulus components are excluded. If a component has genus and boundary components, its complexity is . This is nonnegative for the possible components, with equality precisely for a pair of pants. Summing over the cut components givesFor completeness, if there are components, Euler additivity gives , while , which proves the identity. Hence . If any component has positive complexity, it contains an essential nonperipheral simple closed curve. Its unique geodesic representative stays in that component and is disjoint from the existing boundary geodesics, contradicting maximality. A maximal collection therefore cuts the surface into pairs of pants and hasThe second count follows because each pair of pants has Euler characteristic . Conversely, any topological pants decomposition can be straightened to its disjoint geodesic representatives, so this maximum is attained.
The pants decomposition graph has one vertex for each pair of pants and one edge for each glued cuff. Two cuffs on the same pant give a loop; multiple edges are allowed. It is connected and trivalent, with , and first Betti number . For genus three one possibility is the complete graph . Another has vertices , double edges and , and single edges and . These are nonisomorphic graphs: the second has multiple edges while has none.
There is an explicit diffeomorphism between the represented surfaces. In the decomposition, unite the pants labelled across their shared cuff. This union is a four-holed sphere, whose exterior cuffs lead twice to and twice to . Replace the interior cuff by a simple curve separating the two cuffs from the two cuffs. The new pants then have double adjacencies to respectively, while their shared cuff gives and the untouched original cuff gives . This is an elementary move of a pants decomposition. We have simply recut the same oriented surface, so the identity on that surface is the desired diffeomorphism between its two descriptions. The graphs do not make this evident because they record a chosen pants decomposition, which the diffeomorphism need not preserve; they also omit all lengths and twists.
A hyperbolic pair of pants is uniquely determined up to isometry by its three positive boundary lengths. Cutting along the three perpendicular seams yields two congruent right-angled hexagons, with alternating sides half the cuff lengths; hyperbolic hexagon identities determine the remaining sides. To recover the surface, choose each of the cuff lengths , and for each gluing choose the signed displacement between the seam feet. For a fixed marking and decomposition these are the Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates:Unmarked gluing displacement at one cuff is periodic modulo ; the real lift of remembers the marking, and a full Dehn twist changes it by . To classify unmarked surfaces globally, take the quotient by the mapping class group, allowing changes of pants decomposition as well; if orientation is forgotten, use the extended mapping class group. Lengths alone do not determine the surface: the twists change the geometry of crossing geodesics.
Fix an oriented reference surface . Its Teichmüller space consists of pairs , where is a Riemann surface and is an orientation-preserving marking. Two pairs are equivalent when an orientation-preserving biholomorphism makes isotopic to the other marking. For , the uniformization theorem identifies these with marked hyperbolic metrics. The space is a complex manifold of complex dimension , and Fenchel–Nielsen coordinates identify its underlying real manifold with . For the analytic argument below, the essential property is that these are real-analytic coordinates and the length of every fixed closed curve class is a real-analytic function on Teichmüller space. The length and twist coordinates are not themselves holomorphic coordinates.
The Wolpert generic spectral rigidity theorem says that, for each , there is a closed proper real-analytic subset , of positive codimension, such that if and has the same Laplace-Beltrami operator spectrum as , then are isometric. Equivalently, a generic compact hyperbolic surface is determined by its unmarked length spectrum, with multiplicities. “Isometric” allows reversal of orientation: an unoriented spectrum cannot distinguish a surface from its complex conjugate.
Two major proof steps explain both parts of this conclusion. First is the analytic reduction to finitely many possible spectral matchings locally. The Selberg trace formula identifies the Laplacian spectrum with the unmarked length spectrum. A finite collection of marked length functions determines the length and twist parameters: include pants cuffs and enough transverse curves to determine each twist and its sign. For each assignment of those curves to lengths in a putative partner, the equalities of length functions are real-analytic equations. Uniform length cutoffs on a neighbourhood, bounded geometry of isospectral partners and the discreteness of the length spectrum give local finiteness of the possibilities; finite-length determination of the full spectrum allows the remaining conditions to be reduced to finitely many analytic equations. Thus this is a locally finite analytic problem, not an uncontrolled union of zero sets indexed by infinitely many arbitrary permutations. The role of this step is to put exceptional isospectral coincidences into real-analytic loci and ultimately to give a closed analytic exceptional set.
Second is the geometric recognition of the matchings that can persist on an open set. Such a matching produces identities between length functions as the length and twist parameters vary. Pinching a pants cuff makes its hyperbolic collar wide: by the collar lemma, any crossing curve acquires length tending to infinity, whereas disjoint curves can stay bounded. Varying cuffs and twists separately, together with the hyperbolic trace and hexagon identities for neighbouring pants, identifies which persistent matches preserve simple curves, disjointness and the gluing data. The resulting persistent transformation is induced by a mapping class, possibly with orientation reversal, and so it only gives an isometry of the underlying surfaces. Every other local matching imposes a nonidentical real-analytic equation, whose zero set has positive codimension. Removing these proper exceptional loci proves generic rigidity. The geometric step is indispensable: analyticity alone would not exclude an entire open family of distinct surfaces with the same unmarked length spectrum.
A related useful consequence is that a fixed hyperbolic surface has only finitely many isometry classes of isospectral partners. The common length spectrum fixes the systole, so the partners lie in a compact thick part of moduli space. If distinct partners converged, choose local markings and a finite determining collection of curves. Their lengths converge, but belong to the same discrete length spectrum, so eventually every one of these finitely many lengths is constant. The determining collection then forces the marked metrics to coincide, a contradiction. This compactness-and-discreteness argument proves finiteness; the additional geometric recognition step above is what strengthens it to the generic uniqueness asserted by Wolpert's theorem.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ib Paper 4 15G Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
Use curvature . In the Poincare disc model, hyperbolic lines are Euclidean diameters and arcs of circles orthogonal to the unit circle, with hyperbolic length element . In the upper half-plane model, they are vertical lines and semicircles with centres on the real axis, with . Both displayed hyperbolic metrics are positive scalar multiples of the Euclidean metric, so their angles agree with Euclidean angles. The hyperbolic distance is the length of the joining hyperbolic line segment; explicitly, in the upper half-plane model,In the Poincare disc model it is .
For distinct , a isometry sends their joining hyperbolic line to the imaginary axis, so their images are with . For any continuously differentiable curve joining them,Equality in the first inequality requires everywhere, because the nonnegative difference is continuous. Equality in the second requires to have one sign, allowing zero intervals. Thus equality holds precisely for a monotone reparametrisation of the joining hyperbolic segment. Conversely every such reparametrisation gives equality. For , equality means length zero and the constant curve; monotonicity is understood non-strictly.
Two distinct hyperbolic lines are parallel hyperbolic lines if they are disjoint in the plane and have exactly one common ideal endpoint; they are ultraparallel hyperbolic lines if they are disjoint and have no common ideal endpoint. To prove the common perpendicular of ultraparallel hyperbolic lines theorem, send one line to the imaginary axis. An ultraparallel hyperbolic lines second line can, after reflection if necessary, be written as a semicircle with centre and radius satisfying . A hyperbolic line perpendicular to the imaginary axis must be a semicircle centred at zero, of some radius . The Euclidean condition for its orthogonality to the second circle isThis has exactly one positive solution, proving existence and uniqueness. Conversely, if such a common perpendicular exists, the second line cannot be another vertical line, and the same condition forces , so its endpoints lie strictly on one side of zero and it is ultraparallel hyperbolic lines. This includes exclusion of intersecting lines () and parallel hyperbolic lines ( or another vertical line). The statement concerns distinct lines: a line coincident with itself would have many perpendiculars.
A horocycle in the upper half-plane model is either a Euclidean circle tangent to the real axis from above, with the tangent point as its ideal centre of a horocycle, or a horizontal line , whose ideal centre of a horocycle is infinity. A isometry sending this centre to infinity sends the horocycle to a horizontal line. The hyperbolic lines meeting that horizontal line orthogonally are exactly the vertical lines; therefore the hyperbolic lines orthogonal to a horocycle are exactly those with its ideal centre as an endpoint.
If two horocycles have distinct horocycle centres, the unique hyperbolic line with those two ideal endpoints meets both orthogonally. If they have the same horocycle centre, send it to infinity: both become horizontal lines and every vertical hyperbolic line meets both orthogonally. HenceIn the other case there are infinitely many; intersection or tangency of the two horocycles does not change this classification.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2022 iii Paper 156 1 c Solution 2026-09-28
Because the action is free, the quotient is a closed orientable surface , and is a covering of degree . The Euler characteristic under a finite covering givesor equivalentlyThe quotient inherits a hyperbolic metric, so . Hence and .
Pseudohyperbolic distance 2026-10-14
On the unit disc, the pseudohyperbolic distance isIt is invariant under disc Möbius transformations. For the curvature-minus-one hyperbolic metric with length element , and . The Schwarz-Pick theorem says that holomorphic functions from the disc into itself contract this distance. A Blaschke factor has modulus , so the distance also controls the size of a product with prescribed zeros.

