Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2004 iii Paper 50 4 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Here the sphere's “volume” is its intrinsic -dimensional area, not the volume of the enclosed ball. Write for the area of the unit sphere. The Gaussian integral givesFor completeness the one-dimensional integral is positive and its square is . In hyperspherical coordinates, the same integral isThe substitution is , and the last integral defines the Gamma function. Equating the two evaluations and scaling lengths by proves
Take to mean spacetime dimension, so the number of spatial dimensions is . This convention is needed when comparing five-dimensional spacetime with four-dimensional spacetime. For a point charge , Gauss's law in spatial dimensions givesUsing and choosing for givesThe Green function of the Laplacian with is consequently . Define the gravitational Poisson coupling by , and use acceleration . The same flux calculation givesThis explicitly fixes the normalization of the gravitational coupling: in four dimensions , so . If a higher-dimensional Newton constant is instead defined by the force law , then in the displayed expression. In all conventions the force scales as and the potential as . If “ dimensions” denotes spatial dimensions instead, replace by and the potential exponent is .
For , integration gives and for the Poisson-normalized gravitational model; these logarithmic potentials have no zero-at-infinity convention. For , a fundamental solution of the negative Laplacian is , giving linear potentials up to an additive homogeneous solution.
Now compactify the fourth spatial coordinate on a circle of circumference , retaining three noncompact coordinates with radial distance . In uncompactified five-dimensional spacetime, . A periodic point source is therefore represented by its images:For , write the sum as on the source slice . The spacing tends to zero, so its Riemann sum approaches the integrable function's integral:Thus the compactified Green function is asymptotic to , already proving the four-dimensional inverse-distance law.
An exact expression makes the crossover transparent. The Fourier transform of is , obtained by closing the integration contour around or . Applying the Poisson summation formula then gives, at ,The last equality sums a geometric series. Hence the point-source potential with one compact spatial dimension isAt short distances , and these reproduce the five-dimensional potentials. At long distances , the hyperbolic factor is , giving the four-dimensional potentials with effective Poisson couplings and . Equivalently only the massless Kaluza-Klein mode survives at long distance, while the massive modes contribute exponentially suppressed terms.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2015 iii Paper 48 3 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Let denote the surface area of an n-sphere for the unit sphere . In this notation is the intrinsic dimension of the sphere. Cartesian factorization of the Gaussian integral gives . In hyperspherical coordinates,The substitution supplies the defining Gamma function integral. Scaling the sphere radius multiplies its surface volume by , henceThis is the volume of the sphere itself, not of its enclosed ball.
Take to denote spacetime dimension and spatial dimensions. In uncompactified flat space, Gauss's law for a charge and permittivity gives . Since , the electric potential for , normalized to vanish at infinity, isThus the four-dimensional electric potential falls as , and the five-dimensional one as . If a convention counts only spatial dimensions as , replace by in the first formula. For , the integral instead gives ; for , it gives up to a constant. Neither case has a finite zero at infinity.
For a Newtonian gravitational potential , define the flux-normalized coupling by and acceleration . Exactly the same flux integration gives the attractive potentialIn , reproduces . If is defined by the -dimensional Einstein-Hilbert action , the weak static Einstein field equations give for . ThereforeIndeed, and in signature . A Poisson-defined Newtonian theory in two spatial dimensions has a logarithmic potential, but pure three-dimensional Einstein gravity has no analogous local Newtonian point-mass force; the relativistic normalization must not be extrapolated to that exceptional dimension.
For an unwarped product with a fixed extra-dimensional metric, normalize the Einstein-Hilbert action by . Integrating the part containing the four-dimensional curvature over the internal space gives . Thus, using the reduced Planck mass,This is a volume relation for compactification; a curved sphere additionally requires a mechanism supporting and stabilizing its background. It is not by itself a proof that a sphere times flat spacetime solves a vacuum gravitational theory.
With , and , the spherical-volume factors , , giveThe first estimate is astronomical; the second is roughly a tenth of a millimetre. If both Planck scales are instead defined by , the same algebraic volume relation uses the unreduced . Holding that convention's gives radii larger by : approximately , , . These are different conventions for what is held fixed at one TeV, not different scaling laws.
Finally, compactify the fifth coordinate on a circle of circumference . For a source and observer at the same compact coordinate, the method of images turns a five-dimensional static potential intoOne can derive this image sum without assuming a summation formula. The Fourier transform of is ; Poisson summation then gives , which is the displayed hyperbolic cotangent. ThereforeThe short-distance limit is ; the long-distance limit is the four-dimensional potential. These exponential corrections are the nonzero Kaluza-Klein modes, with masses . For electrostatics , so the effective permittivity is . For a Poisson-normalized gravitational potential, gives . A massless scalar associated with the circle radius also contributes in an unstabilized gravitational compactification; recovering pure four-dimensional Einstein gravity with requires its stabilization or removal. The crossover itself is independent of this tensor-versus-scalar normalization issue.
Radial integration over a ball 2026-10-25
Let be the volume of an n-ball of unit radius in . A radial shell has volume , by differentiating . Integrating shells, or using hyperspherical coordinates, therefore reduces a radial integrand over a Euclidean ball to the displayed one-dimensional integral. The constant is the surface area of an n-sphere of unit radius, with sphere dimension .