Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2004 iii Paper 8 4 ii Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
The intended construction is to solve the Lenard-Magri recursion one step at a time. With a Casimir function of the first Poisson structure, seek satisfyingHere , consistently with part 1(i). If every step can be solved by a globally defined smooth function, the formal series is a Casimir function for the Poisson pencil, and part (i) proves that all the are Poisson-commuting functions for every parameter value after complexification.
The recursive step is a concrete potential problem. Put . It must first be tangent to the symplectic leaves of . On a regular leaf use canonical coordinates . The required equations areThus the leaf one-formmust be exact. Where it is closed on a contractible coordinate domain, define by integrating from a base point; path independence follows from closedness. A function of the leaf labels can be added, corresponding to a Casimir function of the first Poisson structure. Global solvability also requires vanishing periods and smooth matching between leaves. This describes how to perform each solvable step without pretending that a degenerate Poisson structure can simply be inverted.
Compatibility alone does not ensure these solvability conditions. There is an immediate obstruction to a Lenard-Magri recursion even in two dimensions. On takeBoth are Poisson structures, and their linear combination is a scalar multiple of the canonical Poisson bracket, so they are compatible. Every function, including , is a Casimir function for the first bracket. But the first recursion, evaluated at , would requirea contradiction. An arbitrary initial Casimir need not extend even to . Consequently the unconditional existence assertion requires an additional hypothesis: the indicated vector field must be Hamiltonian for at every step. Under that hypothesis the recursive construction and involution proof above complete the intended result; without it the counterexample rules out the requested infinite extension.