Lebesgue's density theorem 2026-10-14
For every Lebesgue measurable set , its Lebesgue density is at almost every point of and at almost every point of its complement.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2022 ii Paper 1 23G Solution Created 2026-09-23 Updated 2026-10-03
The Lebesgue differentiation theorem states that if , thenfor Lebesgue almost every . The Radon-Nikodym theorem states that if two sigma-finite measures satisfy , then there is a nonnegative measurable function , unique -almost everywhere, such that .
For any , take and let be a planar sector of angle . Every disc centred at the origin meets this sector in the proportionso its measure density at is .
Apply the differentiation theorem to the indicator function . Its averages over balls are exactly , so the Lebesgue density theorem givesalmost everywhere. If , every numerator vanishes, so the density is zero wherever its denominator is nonzero. Conversely, if the density vanishes almost everywhere, the displayed identity gives almost everywhere, hence .
Finally suppose and are mutually absolutely continuous measures. Write . Then almost everywhere by the positive Radon-Nikodym derivative result. At almost every , the differentiation theorem applied to both and givesThus the -density also exists and belongs to at -almost every point.