At fixed , use and in the 13-pair rest frame. The endpoint values of its relative cosine give the displayed Dalitz plot boundary. The momenta are fixed by the Källén function; . Integrating gives the invariant-coordinate area, whose phase-space normalization still contains .
Invariant flux factor Created 2026-10-05 Updated 2026-10-06
For two incident particles in relativistic normalization, this is , where is the Källén function. For equal masses it is .
Massless semileptonic pseudoscalar decay rate Created 2026-10-06 Updated 2026-10-07
For a pseudoscalar meson of mass decaying into a pseudoscalar meson of mass and two massless leptons through a weak charged current, the transverse massless leptonic current selects . With hadronic current normalized as and flavour coefficient ,The Källén function has mass dimension four, and the coefficient has mass dimension . This decay rate assumes the stated form-factor normalization and no additional isospin factor. It follows by the integrated massless leptonic tensor and the pion momentum change of variable in the parent's centre-of-momentum frame.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2014 iii Paper 45 3 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
The strong-interaction matrix element between two spin-zero pseudoscalar mesons has only and available. The product of the two intrinsic parities is positive. An axial current would require a pseudovector constructed from these momenta, but an expression involving the Levi-Civita symbol needs three independent four-vectors and therefore vanishes. This is a consequence of parity conservation in the hadronic matrix element, not of parity conservation in the weak interaction. The vector current can have the two independent structures and . Its coefficients are Lorentz scalars; with and fixed, their only varying invariant is . HenceThese are the pseudoscalar-to-pseudoscalar form factors. With relativistically normalized states they are dimensionless. The vanishing axial matrix element and this decomposition explain the two equalities separately.
Write and for the outgoing electron and antineutrino momenta. From the Fermi interaction, an invariant scattering amplitude, up to an irrelevant overall sign or phase, isThe CKM matrix element multiplies the quark current in the convention of this interaction. Let . For massless leptons, the massless Dirac equation and chirality matrix anticommutation giveIn the second term move through the chiral projector before applying . Since , this transverse massless leptonic current givesThe disappearance of uses the massless approximation; for a massive charged lepton its contraction is proportional to the lepton mass.
Use the fermion spin sum and the supplied gamma matrix trace identities. The symmetric part of the leptonic tensor isThe Levi-Civita symbol term is antisymmetric and drops out when contracted with . ThusThere is no initial-spin average because the kaon is spinless. For the integrated massless leptonic tensor, keep every factor of explicit and define the unnormalized two-lepton Lorentz-invariant phase spaceThe leptons are massless, so . Its trace is . ThereforeThe three Lorentz-invariant phase-space measures and their momentum delta function contribute , in addition to in the decay rate. Combining them with the spin sum givesThis massless semileptonic pseudoscalar decay rate uses a two-lepton integral over future-timelike and the pion integral is restricted to the physically allowed region. The null endpoint follows by continuity. The coefficient has mass dimension , so the complete expression has mass dimension one, as a decay rate must in natural units.
In the kaon centre-of-momentum frame, put and . ThenThe dimensionally consistent Källén function isThe pion-only mass term must have fourth power: the second power printed in the PDF is dimensionally inconsistent. This repair also follows directly from squaring . Angular integration and the change of variable givewhere the negative sign reverses the endpoints. Combining this with the bracket yieldsThus . The lower limit is the minimum invariant mass of two massless leptons; at the upper limit the pion is at rest. The coefficient has mass dimension , while has dimension eight. The Källén function also shows why the differential decay rate vanishes at zero pion momentum.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2018 iii Paper 301 3 iii Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
Use the Lorentz-invariant phase-space measure from the original PDF, including the and factors missing from the local TeX. In the center of mass frame put and , assuming . The spatial Dirac delta distribution sets , leavingSince , the radial integral givesThe invariant flux factor is , using the Källén function. Dividing the phase space by this flux yields , with the final-state labels retained as in the printed formula.
Let . Of the Mandelstam variables, isThe azimuthal integral contributes , and the angular endpoints are thereforeChanging variables gives the requested expression from the formula supplied in the paper:There is a normalization qualification: the displayed starting formula integrates over labeled final momenta and contains no . For the physical cross-section of two indistinguishable outgoing quanta of this real scalar field, the identical-particle factor in a final-state phase-space integral divides the full integral by two. With that convention ; equivalently, integrate only one representative of each exchanged pair. The boxed value follows the given formula exactly.
Conservation laws. Use natural units and write with the metric. In the parent's rest frame, which is the final-state centre-of-momentum frame, . Four-momentum conservation and the relativistic energy-momentum relation giveA real massless daughter has strictly positive energy. The kinematic threshold is ; below, no decay satisfying these conditions exists. The endpoint discussion assumes open phase space, , to avoid collapsed threshold configurations.
Two-body energies. Momentum conservation requires , so both daughters have the same momentum magnitude . Their on-shell relations implyand subtraction eliminates :Since , solving the sum and difference equations gives the relativistic two-body decay resultAs a check, their common momentum magnitude iswhere is the Källén function. It vanishes at the massive two-body threshold and is real on the allowed side. If the symbols denote masses in kilograms rather than rest energies, multiply the displayed energy formulas by and the displayed momentum formula by .
Minimum energy in three-body decay. The on-shell inequality already gives . For , the bound is attainable by putting daughter 1 at rest and letting daughters 2 and 3 recoil back to back:The last equation has a solution because ; its left side increases continuously from to infinity. ThusIf , the same formula describes the lower boundary . It is an infimum, not an attained physical zero-energy massless particle: this is a soft-particle endpoint.
Maximum energy from the recoil mass. Group daughters 2 and 3 into a recoil system with four-momentum and squared invariant mass . Directly in the parent rest frame,Maximizing therefore means minimizing the recoil invariant mass. This approach does not assume a recoil rest frame when that system is null.
If both recoil daughters have positive masses, use their pair rest frame. Their total energy there is at least , with equality when both are at rest relative to one another. Equivalently, their future-directed four-velocities satisfy , givingEquality means the two recoil daughters have a common velocity in the parent frame: their momenta are parallel and . Daughter 1 recoils in the opposite direction. HenceAt this endpoint their total energy and its sharing areThese explicitly exhibit a permitted configuration attaining the bound when both recoil masses are positive.
If exactly one recoil daughter is massless, say and , work in the rest frame of daughter 2. For any positive photon-like daughter energy there,The lower recoil-mass bound is approached only as . Thus the same general formula with is the supremum of for a genuine three-body event, rather than an attained maximum. Interchanging 2 and 3 covers the other mixed case. The distinction is important because the paper's category “at least one has mass” includes this soft-particle endpoint as well as the attainable two-massive-particle case.
If both recoil daughters are massless, instead computeIt can be exactly zero at nonzero when their momenta are parallel. Then , and momentum conservation makes . Solving and givesBoth recoil daughters can have positive energies: set and for any . This endpoint is attained without a soft daughter, even though their combined four-momentum is null and has no rest frame.
Combining the three-body decay energy endpoints, the closed kinematic range isFor masses in ordinary units, multiply both endpoint expressions by . Open endpoints occur precisely in the soft limits described above. These bounds specify kinematic possibilities; the decay amplitude can still vanish at a boundary, so a possible endpoint need not have a nonzero event density.
Work in the parent's rest frame, with . Four-momentum conservation givesso both daughter momenta have magnitude . Their relativistic energy-momentum relations give and . Subtracting these two relations and using the total energy yieldsSubstitution back gives the relativistic two-body decay momentum:The unit vector is not fixed by four-momentum conservation alone. The expression under the square root is the Källén function . The physical two-body decay threshold is ; for massive daughters equality gives zero outgoing momentum. For two massless daughters, each has energy and momentum magnitude .