Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 ia Paper 1 12E c Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
Let be the set where the indicator function equals one. Fix a positive integer . Each permitted length- decimal prefix gives the intervalThere are such intervals, each of length , and they cover . Every point of is strictly inside the interval for its prefix, since its remaining tail lies between and . Thus none of the interval endpoints belongs to . The intervals are disjoint and separated: their distinct prefix integers cannot be consecutive because their final digits are only and .
The complement consists of finitely many closed intervals on which , of total length . Part (b) therefore already proves Riemann integrability, since this length tends to one.
To compute the Riemann integral directly, make a partition of an interval using and all the endpoints of the . On complementary cells the upper Darboux sum contribution is zero, and on the it is at most their total length. Moreover every nonempty cell contains a terminating decimal, which is not in : neither its terminating expansion with a zero tail nor its alternative expansion with a nine tail consists entirely of twos and sevens. Such decimals are dense, so every cell has infimum zero. ThereforeLetting gives the exact answerThis is an example of an indicator of a restricted-digit decimal set: infinitely many, indeed uncountably many, points can support an indicator function whose Riemann integral is zero.