Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 328 1 ii Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Use the Bromwich inversion formula in the real variable , with :When the relevant Laplace transforms and spatial integral transforms are explicit, every sample of this integrand can be evaluated directly, without a time-stepping approximation to the partial differential equation. Split the initial condition integral at : the two pieces of are linear combinations of , so truncated spatial exponential transforms suffice. For real data the negative-frequency half is the complex conjugate of the positive-frequency half.
A practical numerical integration is to truncate to , apply an adaptive quadrature rule, and independently increase and refine the quadrature. Choose large enough to remain to the right of all singularities, but avoid an unnecessarily large . Evaluate hyperbolic function ratios in scaled form; for example,This prevents overflow when is large. The boundary contributions at an interior point are damped by or , with . Near an endpoint more frequencies are needed; at the endpoint itself use the prescribed Dirichlet boundary condition. The initial condition resolvent has a generally only tail. Treat its oscillatory tail accurately, subtract a known transform with the same leading term, or evaluate that contribution separately with the heat kernel.
An equally useful check is the eigenfunction expansion. DefineThe causal modal formula isIt follows either from the heat kernel formula or directly from integration by parts against a sine eigenfunction. Exponential-transform formulas evaluate the time integral explicitly when available. The initial condition contribution has a Gaussian function cutoff in for each positive time. Nonzero endpoint forcing produces a more slowly convergent sine series tail. A boundary lifting gives , where has zero Dirichlet boundary conditions and forcing ; expanding gives better convergence and imposes the endpoint values exactly. At very small times the method of images is often more efficient than retaining many modes.
Check convergence by increasing both the frequency cutoff and quadrature resolution, and compare with a separately truncated causal modal or image-kernel evaluation. Causality in finite-time Laplace contour inversion means a leftward contour deformation must respect both resolvent operator poles and growth of the transformed data. In particular, the transform of data extended by zero after can grow like in the left half-plane: for one cannot close that contour indiscriminately and discard its large arc. The modal forcing integral with upper limit avoids this causality error.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 336 1 a Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
The expansion is singular near the moving lower limit, so expanding throughout the original integral would lose its constant term. Introduce the symmetric exponential integralUnder , the discarded piece becomesThis is a uniform Taylor expansion because . To derive the logarithmic expansion of a symmetric exponential integral without needing another special function, first exploit the same substitution to writeThe estimate follows from . Here is Euler's constant and the small-argument expansion of the exponential integral fixes the constant as well as the logarithm.
Differentiate under the integral and integrate the derivative of over ; the exponentially small endpoint terms vanish. This gives the ordinary differential equationFor the Frobenius method at its regular singular point, write . Substitution gives and . The preceding leading calculation sets , , henceSubtracting the moving-cutoff correction to a symmetric exponential integral yields the requested answer, including the logarithmically enhanced first-order term:Thus the switchback term must be retained when asking for all contributions through order .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2016 iii Paper 336 2 a iii Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Define the nested integralThe order- equation in the inner expansion is . The preceding result decomposes its forcing into . The particular solutions combine toFor example, follows directly by differentiating the nested integral, so the equation can also be verified without relying on the supplied particular-solution formulas. At zero ; add to impose the left boundary condition. As this givesThe outer expansion in the overlap, derived in the previous section, requires the remaining constant to be . Thus . The logarithmic matching constant is an error-function logarithmic switchback.
The complete answer through order in the inner expansion isHere , and . This expression is zero at , and its large- expansion agrees with . Together with , it covers both requested regions. The overlap uses , with the usual termwise ordering restrictions when matching higher terms.
If a single continuous approximation is desired, an additive composite expansion isThe apparent logarithmic divergence at cancels: its residual is . The composite therefore extends continuously to the left endpoint and satisfies the right boundary condition to the requested order.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ib Paper 1 14B b Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
For smooth rapidly decaying initial data, apply the Fourier transform in and differentiate under the integral. The Fourier transform of a derivative turns the wave equation intoSolving this constant-coefficient ordinary differential equation givesAt the quotient means its continuous limit , so .
Since , the Translation property of the Fourier transform inverts the first term as . Also has Fourier transform , including its limiting value at zero. The convolution theorem therefore inverts the second term asThis proves the D'Alembert formulaThe formula itself extends beyond the rapidly decaying class: and suffice for a classical solution, verified by differentiation and the two initial conditions. The decay assumption above justifies the ordinary transform derivation without distributional qualifications.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ib Paper 1 4D Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
Take a smooth variation with on the boundary. Assume enough differentiability for the following operations, for example a smooth bounded open set, , and a twice continuously differentiable integrand. Differentiation under the integral givesBy integration by parts, the boundary term vanishes and the first variation isStationarity for every such variation, including every compactly supported smooth one, and the fundamental lemma of the calculus of variations give the Euler-Lagrange equationFor the quadratic integrand, , , and . Thuswith the prescribed Dirichlet boundary condition. For real , a stationary function is also the unique minimizer, if it exists: for any nonzero admissible , the linear term vanishes and . This last positivity uses the zero boundary values; it also holds at .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 201 3 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
Work on as a probability space, with Lebesgue measure of total mass one. Let be the filtration generated by the level- half-open dyadic cells together with the separate null cell . Define the dyadic slope martingale byThe endpoint may be assigned any value, since it is a null set for Lebesgue measure. The two child slopes average to their parent slope, by telescoping the two increments. Therefore almost everywhere, so this is a martingale. The Lipschitz condition gives everywhere except possibly at the freely chosen endpoint, where we take zero.
Apply the Lp martingale convergence theorem with . Its limit has almost everywhere and in L1 norm as well, by Cauchy-Schwarz inequality. Choose a measurable representative of and set it to zero on any exceptional null set; it is then a bounded measurable function on the entire interval.
Set . Telescoping at the grid points shows that is the linear interpolation of on the dyadic grid. The Lipschitz condition gives . AlsoThe two uniform limits coincide, giving the absolutely continuous function representationThe chosen bound holds for every after the null-set modification; the integral identity holds for every simultaneously.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 201 3 d Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
Use the same dyadic slope martingale and dyadic filtration as in (c). Each is integrable, since it takes finitely many finite values. On each dyadic cell, the absolute slope is times the absolute endpoint increment. Consequently the hypothesis in the PDF is exactlyThus is uniformly integrable. It is also bounded in L1 norm: choose a finite at which the supremum of the tails is finite, and use . The uniformly integrable martingale convergence theorem supplies with in L1 norm.
The functions are again the dyadic linear interpolations of . Since is continuous on a compact interval, it is uniformly continuous, and , where is its modulus of continuity. On the other hand, the integral of is uniformly bounded in absolute value by . Hence the dyadic slope-tail criterion for absolute continuity givesNo boundedness of is asserted here; the tail condition permits integrable densities that are unbounded.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 216 1 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Adaptive rejection sampling is exact rejection sampling for a differentiable log-concave probability density. Given interior evaluation points , construct the upper envelopewhere is the unnormalized target probability density function. The concave function lies below all its tangent lines, so . Interpolation between adjacent evaluation points gives a lower envelope there, allowing a squeeze test. The normalized upper envelope is a piecewise exponential proposal distribution.
Draw and an independent from the uniform distribution, and accept when . A squeeze test can establish acceptance without evaluating . Otherwise evaluate and, whenever it is evaluated, add to the envelope's points. Repeat until acceptance. On each linear piece , its integral is on , with value when . These integrals select a piece; inverse transform sampling samples within it.
Here, with and , the log-posterior on hasChoose evaluation points strictly inside , avoiding any endpoint singularities of the logarithm. Every finite set of tangent lines gives a finite upper-envelope integral on this bounded interval; slope conditions needed for unbounded supports are unnecessary. When the posterior distribution is simply the uniform distribution and may be sampled directly.
For any fixed envelope, proposal times acceptance is proportional to . Conditional on all past evaluations and rejections, the next accepted value therefore has the same normalized posterior density. To see that adaptation does not spoil this, at every attempted draw its accepted mass is a scalar times that fixed posterior density; summing over possible rejection histories preserves it. The acceptance probability stays bounded below by its positive initial-envelope value because insertion only lowers the upper envelope. Thus acceptance occurs almost surely. With fresh independent randomness, successive accepted values are exact independent samples from the posterior distribution, even when the envelope is retained and improved between them.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 311 4 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Work first in units . Black-hole thermodynamics starts with the laws of black-hole mechanics. For a connected stationary regular Killing horizon, the Zeroth law of black-hole mechanics makes its surface gravity constant when the Einstein field equations and dominant energy condition hold. This parallels uniform equilibrium temperature. For neighboring stationary asymptotically flat four-dimensional Einstein-Maxwell black holes, the First law of black-hole mechanics iswhere is the horizon angular velocity and its electric potential relative to infinity. The last terms are rotational and electromagnetic work, analogous to the work terms in . The second law of black-hole mechanics, expressed by Hawking's area theorem, makes the total future horizon area nondecreasing for classical matter obeying the null energy condition and global assumptions such as strong asymptotic predictability. The third law of black-hole mechanics is an unattainability statement: subject to the usual regularity assumptions, the weak energy condition, and a bounded stress-energy tensor, no finite physical process reduces the surface gravity of a regular horizon to zero. It does not assert that extremal black holes have zero area or zero entropy.
Classical geometry alone fixes an analogy, not a nonzero physical temperature. Quantum field theory supplies Hawking temperature . Comparing the area term of the first law with gives for nonextremal holes, and hence the standard Bekenstein-Hawking entropy. Restoring physical constants,Here restored is the physical acceleration surface gravity and is the squared Planck length. The first-law comparison determines the area coefficient, leaving an additive entropy constant unspecified; the displayed formula is the usual convention. Its area scaling, rather than ordinary volume scaling, signals that the available thermodynamic degrees of freedom of a gravitating system are constrained by the horizon geometry.
Particle production explains the quantum input. For a real scalar field obeying the massless covariant wave equation, the Klein-Gordon inner product on solutions isThe wave equation makes its current divergence-free, so the product is independent of a Cauchy hypersurface when the boundary flux vanishes. Use suitably normalized wave packets or the appropriate continuum distributions. Asymptotic past and future Minkowski spacetimes give preferred positive-frequency solution mode bases and , normalized by , and . Between those regions, a nonstationary geometry generally has no preferred positive-frequency splitting.
The mode bases are related by a Bogoliubov transformation,The last identities follow from conservation of the Klein-Gordon inner product and are the canonical identities for a bosonic Bogoliubov transformation. Expanding the field in either complete basis and extracting its positive-frequency coefficient givesThus the state annihilated by every hasThis particle number from Bogoliubov coefficients is nonzero when time evolution mixes positive and negative frequencies. It describes one state as vacuum in the early particle basis and populated in the late basis; it does not require an arbitrary choice of a vacuum at each intermediate time. For a finite implementable transformation the state remains a squeezed pure quantum state. In infinitely many modes, a common unitary bosonic Fock space implementation requires additional conditions, such as the beta map being a Hilbert-Schmidt operator; finite wave packet observables need not share every global divergence of an ideal continuum calculation.
For gravitational collapse, the future is not globally Minkowski: it contains a black hole. The relevant late out-basis includes modes reaching future null infinity together with modes entering the future event horizon. Modes on infinity alone are not a complete Cauchy basis. Nevertheless the same mode-mixing calculation determines the outgoing particle flux. Near a nonextremal horizon, the logarithm in the tortoise coordinate converts regular early null coordinates into the Hawking exponential ray mapwhere is the early affine null coordinate and is late retarded time at infinity. Backward propagation of a late outgoing mode gives a factor for . Its positive- and negative-frequency Fourier integrals differ by analytic continuation around the logarithmic branch. With a convergence regulator they reduce toTaking gives the thermal ratio of Hawking Bogoliubov coefficients, . Combining this with the canonical normalization yields the bosonic occupation . Late-time wave packets turn formal continuum coefficients into a finite number flux.
A Schwarzschild black hole has , so this spectrum has . The exterior curvature potential partly reflects the outgoing modes. Its transmission probabilities are the greybody factors, giving, for one massless scalar species in the stationary late-time approximation,Thus the horizon temperature is universal, while the spectrum received at infinity is not a perfect featureless blackbody radiation spectrum. The derivation assumes the near-horizon quantum state inherited from a regular collapse vacuum and ignores rapid backreaction over the timescale of the packets. Exponentially blueshifted precursor frequencies indicate the usual short-distance assumption in the semiclassical calculation, not an independently demonstrated quantum-gravity description of the endpoint.
The outgoing positive energy flux drives black-hole evaporation. At leading order for a large isolated Schwarzschild black hole, area scales as and temperature as , giving and a lifetime of order , with the coefficient depending on species and transmission factors. Its negative heat capacity of a Schwarzschild black hole, , means that it heats up as it loses mass and cannot be in stable canonical equilibrium with an unlimited thermal reservoir. The approximation fails when quantum-gravitational scales are reached and does not fix whether the endpoint is complete evaporation, a remnant, or something else.
Area loss does not contradict the classical area theorem, because the quantum stress-energy tensor need not obey the classical null energy condition; negative horizon energy accompanies the positive outgoing flux. The appropriate thermodynamic statement is the generalized second law, involving . Finally, Hawking radiation raises the black hole information paradox: if a pure quantum state completely evaporates into an exactly thermal mixed quantum state and its partners disappear, the result conflicts with ordinary unitary time evolution. Early outgoing radiation can be mixed simply because of its entanglement with interior modes while the complete state remains a pure quantum state; that fact alone is not information loss. Resolving the fate of all correlations through the evaporation endpoint requires more than the leading semiclassical flux calculation.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 320 1 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Put and let now mean number per area. During time , the two strips of impact parameters between and , on opposite sides of the trajectory, have combined area . ThusThe same straight-line impulse approximation gives a kick . Summing its squared size over these encounters givesassuming . The relevant change is now the small random speed , not the full circular speed . Setting yieldsThe razor-thin disk relaxation integral is dominated by nearby encounters, rather than equally by logarithmic intervals. Because kicks cease to be weak near the cutoff, its numerical coefficient is an estimate.
Here the weak-deflection cutoff must use the relative speed: , which is larger than the spherical cutoff. Thus . Using and from the virial theorem givesFor example gives the order-one coefficient in this last substitution; the paper's approximate equality suppresses such structural factors. The cancellation of is the central result.
An unsoftened point-particle system confined to an infinitesimally thin plane is therefore not collisionless over orbital times for in this encounter model. At fixed total mass, increasing decreases and the cutoff together; the enhanced importance of close planar encounters cancels the usual benefit of increasing particle number. This is a singular zero-thickness limit. A fixed nonzero gravitational softening length or physical thickness restores a different dependence, so the conclusion is not a prohibition on collisionless numerical models of disks.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 320 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Assume a time-independent spherical relative potential , with acceleration . The relative energy and specific angular momentum areAlong an orbit, and , since a spherical gradient is radial. Thus both and are integrals of motion. Choose the escape level and take the bound galactic distribution function to vanish for .
For an isotropic , integrate over a spherical coordinate system in velocity space:Differentiating gives . Convolve once more with the reciprocal-square-root kernel. Reversing the order of integration, under the usual integrability assumptions, usesTherefore . Differentiating proves Eddington inversion:Here is outside the square root, as in the original PDF; the TeX transcription wrongly places it inside. The assumptions include a locally integrable bound distribution and sufficient density regularity, with no extra unbound or boundary population. An inverted expression must additionally be nonnegative to be physical. Since the velocity measure and are invariant under all velocity rotations, whenever these moments exist; mixed moments vanish.
For the half-anisotropic distribution function, write the polar velocity angle from the radial direction as . Then , andThe apparent singularity is integrable because it cancels the factor in the velocity measure. Integrating and givesThe density relation requires at the escape boundary and for a physical distribution. Consider a monotonically decreasing . The largest allowed radius at fixed binding energy is the radial-orbit limit with ; a nonzero- orbit normally has a smaller apocenter because of its centrifugal term. Changing from to givesThe numerator in the original PDF instead uses . That is a genuine printed error: the chain rule for requires . It is not legitimate to prove the printed expression as written. A concrete counterexample is the unit-parameter Hernquist model at : , and . The printed quotient is , whereas the correct is . The former would give a negative distribution.
The angular weight after cancellation is uniform in , so the averages of and are both . The azimuthal angle splits the tangential term equally. Hence and each individual tangential moment is half the radial one. The velocity-anisotropy parameter is consequentlyThis is a radially biased constant-anisotropy distribution function, not an isotropic one or purely radial motion. It does not by itself prove dynamical stability; it preferentially weights small angular momentum while remaining integrable.
For the Hernquist model, use the Poisson equation for Newtonian gravity with the relative-potential sign, . Since ,Its enclosed mass is , which tends to . Expressing the augmented density in the relative potential gives . The preceding derivative therefore giveswith zero bound-model population outside the allowed energy domain. It is nonnegative and reproduces the density by direct integration. The Hernquist model has a central density cusp, so the formulas for the local distribution are interpreted at . As a further check, the radial second moment obtained from the same integral is and each tangential second moment is , consistent with .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 320 3 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Use the same specified homogeneous Newtonian background and Jeans swindle, but describe stars by a mass-normalized galactic distribution function. The Collisionless Boltzmann equation is . Let and similarly perturb the gravitational potential. To first order,Eliminating and the nonzero gravitational potential amplitude gives the collisionless Jeans dispersion relationFor growing modes there is no real-velocity pole. Real and damped frequencies require a causal contour prescription or analytic continuation; one must not simply integrate through a pole without specifying it.
Take in the Cauchy velocity distribution. Its normalization is . Orient along the axis and integrate over the perpendicular velocities:At the marginal mode , , with its finite limiting value at zero. The provided Gamma function integral at power two givesConsequentlyTo check that this really separates growing modes, put in the upper half-plane. Residue integration, or integration by parts followed by the Cauchy resolvent, gives . The upper-half-plane solution has , which grows exactly for . At the threshold it approaches the marginal mode continuously. Although plays the threshold role of a velocity scale, this distribution's second moment diverges: the radial integrand for tends to a nonzero constant at large speed. It is therefore incorrect to identify with a finite velocity dispersion or to infer this result by substituting an rms speed into a fluid formula.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 320 4 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
For a regular Lagrangian define the canonical momentum components . Require the velocity Hessian to be invertible locally so that the velocities can be expressed in terms of . The Legendre transform in mechanics definesThe explicit time argument cannot generally be omitted when the given Lagrangian depends on time. Its differential is , since the terms cancel. The Euler-Lagrange equations give , and comparison yields Hamilton's equations:For the time-independent stellar gravitational potential below, is conserved. Its sign convention differs from the binding energy in question 2: here is the ordinary specific orbital energy.
The prescribed nondegenerate prolate spheroidal coordinates require ; equality collapses the coordinate family. Their physical velocity components are , and . Per unit stellar mass the Lagrangian is , so . Its Hamiltonian isThis uses acceleration , as specified, rather than importing the opposite gravitational potential convention.
For the Stäckel potential, use the Hamilton-Jacobi equation with principal function . Axisymmetry makes constant. Write and . Multiplying by and usingseparates it as , where . Each side depends on its own coordinate only and therefore equals a constant, chosen as . Here is the generating function of the gravitational potential, not the gravitational constant. HenceThis proves the conserved axisymmetric Stäckel third integral. Eliminating between the two expressions and using givesAt regular generic phase-space points the three separation constants are independent; special circular or degenerate orbits can reduce their local independence. Thus the model is an integrable Hamiltonian system.
For the intended regular, phase-mixed steady model, Jeans theorem permits a galactic distribution function . At any fixed point, and depend on and only through their squares, and depends only on . Thus is even separately in and , whether or not it is even in . Odd integration proves velocity-ellipsoid alignment in a Stäckel potential:The argument allows azimuthal streaming: it does not require zero mean . The means in the two meridional directions vanish, so the off-diagonal velocity covariance also vanishes. Second moments must exist for this conclusion.
There is a hypothesis behind the printed universal wording. On a generic nonresonant regular invariant torus, a continuous steady distribution is constant along a dense orbit and hence depends only on the torus integrals; this justifies the phase-mixed form. Bare stationarity alone is not sufficient in a degenerate resonant gravitational potential with additional integrals. For example is a Stäckel Hamiltonian: choose , up to a constant vacuum shift. The additional conserved quantity gives a positive normalizable steady tracer for . Its local . At azimuth zero and a regular point where the direction has a radial component, this gives nonzero . This tracer need not itself source the harmonic gravitational potential. It exhibits why the stronger, ordinary phase-mixed three-integral assumption is necessary instead of claiming that every imaginable steady distribution has the asserted alignment.
The geometry follows by multiplying the coordinate-defining equation and evaluating at :Constant surfaces are prolate spheroids, with equatorial semiaxis and polar semiaxis . Constant interior surfaces are two-sheeted hyperboloids. Their common foci lie at . The orbit volume in an axisymmetric Stäckel potential is determined byIts allowed coordinate intervals have turning boundaries or coordinate endpoints. A typical bound orbit with oscillates between inner and outer spheroids, oscillates vertically between hyperboloidal limits, and circulates about the symmetry axis with . The equatorial fold joins the positive and negative branches; it is not necessarily a physical turning point in .
For three incommensurate frequencies, the regular trajectory densely samples its projected allowed volume, with nonuniform occupation determined by its speeds. It does not follow one coordinate surface, and it need not close. Resonant orbits may be closed or lie in a smaller projected set; confines azimuthal motion to a meridional plane (with the usual axis coordinate qualification), and circular or equatorial limits are also lower-dimensional. Smooth Stäckel separation removes the generic chaotic behavior of nonintegrable potentials; it does not assert that every orbit fills a three-dimensional volume.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 329 2 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Use , , , and . Locally replace in the preceding annular viscous extension calculation by . Its leading pressure isThe axial liquid stress relative to ambient pressure, together with the two circumferential surface tension forces, transmits a cut forceIt would be incorrect simply to differentiate this and retain an extra gas-pressure term. The sloping inner gas interface also exerts an axial pressure force per unit height, after subtracting the common ambient pressure contribution. For constant gas pressures these terms cancel. The resulting capillary tensile force of a hollow slender thread therefore givesThus the printed axial equation holds even for unequal constant gas pressures; their influence remains in the radial evolution.
For equal pressures, the kinematic boundary condition from the previous calculation becomes . Multiplying by the appropriate integrating factor givesAt closure , so and . HenceThe right side is positive for a genuine annulus. On the gravity-driven quadratic family from the previous part, grows linearly with height and this integral diverges logarithmically. It must then reach the finite positive threshold at a finite height. This explains the expected capillary closure of a falling hollow thread on that freely falling branch without requiring its full coupled profile.
There is a real boundary-data limitation to that expectation. Neither the printed nozzle speed nor the local equations alone guarantee finite closure for every imposed nozzle tension. To see this within the same leading model, define , so . For equal pressures and , both radii decrease and . Ifthen a bootstrap gives and : the maximum accumulated weight is smaller than the assumed tension margin. Consequently the closure integral, including its prefactor, is at most . If this is smaller than , closure never occurs at finite height. For example, in consistent units choose , , , , . Then , the weight bound is , and . Small makes the initial geometry slender. Thus finite closure is the expected freely falling branch behaviour, not a theorem following from nozzle speed alone. If there is no capillary closure by this mechanism.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 329 3 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
This is a squeezing motion, not the rotational motion of the previous part. The gap changes at rate . The Reynolds lubrication equation therefore givesThe outer wall also has tangential speed , but its local Couette flow flux is compared with the squeezing flux and does not affect the leading force. Thus at leading order. Periodic pressure gives , because the integral of vanishes over a full circle. Balancing pressure traction on the fixed inner cylinder and using integration by parts,The supplied integral gives the squeeze resistance of an eccentric journal bearing:The fluid tends to pull the inner cylinder upwards with the moving outer wall, so a downward holding force is required when . At concentricity the translation resistance is . The omitted wall-tangential flux and shear traction give smaller thin-gap contributions.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 331 2 a Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Let and . For , never vanishes, so an analytic branch of a square root exists along the real flow domain. Take real smooth velocity and buoyancy frequency coefficients, nonzero (chosen positive for the growing-wave convention), a nontrivial regular normal mode, and boundary decay strong enough to remove the integration-by-parts term.
Substitution into the Taylor–Goldstein equation gives the half-power case of the power-transformed Taylor–Goldstein energy identity:For completeness, differentiating yields , which explains the coefficient .
Multiply by and integrate over . The boundary term is zero for the given homogeneous endpoint conditions, or for sufficiently decaying finite-energy modes at infinity. ThereforeSince , , and are real, taking the imaginary part and dividing by givesThe first two terms have strictly positive integral for a nonzero mode. Thus cannot be nonnegative everywhere:This proves the Miles–Howard theorem in contrapositive form. Where , the corresponding gradient Richardson number must fall below somewhere. Failure of this sufficient-stability criterion does not prove instability. The derivation uses ; it cannot be applied unchanged to a neutral singular critical layer.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 336 2 a iii Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
For fixed , the linear term vanishes at . Put and resolve its neighborhood using . The integral is dominated by the resulting narrow peak:The local Taylor expansion of the logarithm changes it by a vanishing relative amount on this width, while both endpoints are many peak widths away for fixed .
There is no additional breakdown when : the peak approaches , but its distance from that endpoint is , whereas its width is . Thus . The relative logarithm variation over a width is , also improving as grows. For with fixed these separation conditions hold uniformly, including arbitrarily large . In particularThe only endpoint transition requiring a new distinguished limit is the earlier one near , where the peak approaches . Moving toward an endpoint is not by itself a reason for nonuniformity; the peak width must be compared with its endpoint distance.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 336 2 a ii Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
The small denominator lies near when approaches . Its two contributions balance when and . Letwith fixed real . Then and in the contributing region. The endpoint transition of a regularized interior pole givesIndeed, the leading scaled integral is . The upper endpoint can be sent to infinity at leading order because the omitted tail contributes only to the original integral. At the result is : only one half of the narrow peak lies in the domain.
This formula provides the required matching. For , , giving . For it tends to , giving , the limit of the interior-peak approximation. These are overlap regions with , not assertions that the fixed- remainder is uniform to arbitrarily large .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 336 3 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
The three distinguished limits are the outer expansion at , an intermediate asymptotic region at , and an inner expansion at . The middle scale resolves the coefficient change from to ; the narrower scale resolves the unmet left boundary condition. The original equation is understood on with a continuous extension to the boundary. As explained below, imposing a classical second derivative at would be too strong for this degenerate ordinary differential equation.
In the outer expansion, set . The leading equation is . Enforcing the right boundary condition gives . Because , the next equation is particularly simple:An integrating factor, or the substitution , gives . ThusThe error statement is for bounded away from zero. The left limiting form is through the terms needed for matching. A logarithm in the correction makes a pure integer-power inner ansatz inadequate.
For the intermediate asymptotic region, put and . The transformed equation isThe leading is a constant fixed to by matching. There is no order- forcing, so that homogeneous constant is zero after matching. At order , , giving . Matching for with the outer expansion fixes . HenceThe switchback term is larger than an ordinary constant correction and must be retained. The highest derivative term first changes this middle solution at order , so it does not alter the displayed result.
To locate the inner expansion, compare the derivative terms for . Their ratio at a layer width is , so the square-root-degenerate endpoint layer has . Put and . After dividing by the common leading factor, the equation through order isBoth orders therefore have the same homogeneous operator . Its derivative mode is proportional to . Using and the supplied elementary integral, defineThe intermediate asymptotic region gives the overlap value as . ThereforeIt satisfies the left boundary condition exactly to the retained orders, and its large- limit matches the middle result in . The outer and middle limits match with . These three formulae include all terms through , including the logarithmic switchback; the omitted terms in the middle and inner regions need not be .
For a check on that last point, continue the middle equation by one order. Its term obeysThe integration constant is selected by the outer limit. Its value at is , so the inner matching amplitude has a next correction . This independently explains why an remainder is appropriate.
If a single additive composite expansion is useful, combine the three formulae and subtract their two common overlaps. Writing and interpreting at zero givesIt is zero at , gives at , and reproduces all three retained expansions. It does not assert an error uniformly through the nested regions.
Finally, near zero . Thus the solution has a finite nonzero first derivative but generally a second derivative diverging like . This is compatible with the equation for : the vanishing coefficient of multiplies that singular derivative to give a finite limit. If one instead required and the differential equation pointwise at , the left condition would force . The normalized equation's other coefficients have only integrable singularities, so uniqueness for the initial value problem with would give the zero solution, contradicting the right condition. Explicitly, write the normalized equation as a first-order system for with an integrable coefficient matrix; its integral equation and the Gronwall inequality force a solution with zero initial vector to vanish. The continuous-endpoint interpretation is therefore essential.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 340 2 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Use localization and cancellation of the assumed interval-adapted wavelet basis: at scale , every detail wavelet has support diameter at most , L1 norm at most , and annihilates polynomials of degree less than . These bounds also apply to the modified boundary wavelets; a restriction of an arbitrary whole-line wavelet without the cancellation-preserving boundary construction would not suffice. The finitely many coarse scaling functions can be treated separately.
Write with as above. Because , we have . Choose in the support of a function of , and let be the degree- Taylor polynomial of . The Hölder-Taylor remainder bound givesFor this is the Hölder seminorm bound. For , the integral Taylor remainder is bounded using , whose magnitude is at most .
The vanishing moments remove from the inner product. Applying the remainder estimate and the L1 norm bound on the localized support yields the wavelet coefficient decay for Hölder functionsThusHere depends on the fixed wavelet family, the exponent and boundary construction, but not on . The proof uses the assumed regularity and moments; it does not identify the minimal Daubechies wavelet order with its differentiability order, which need not coincide.
