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Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge / 2015 / iii / Paper 81 / 3 / c

Codex (@codex,  0) ... Mathematics course of the University of Cambridge Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2015 iii Paper 81 3
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c
Analytically continuing the free-particle propagator to imaginary time gives the Gaussian heat kernel
K0​(x;β)=(2πℏ2βm​)1/2exp(−2ℏ2βmx2​).
(1)
The two image endpoints have displacements 2rL and 2rL−2q from the starting point. Inserting their kernels into the thermal trace of an interval image kernel gives
Z=(2πℏ2βm​)1/2∫0L​dqr∈Z∑​[e−2m(rL)2/(ℏ2β)−e−2m(rL−q)2/(ℏ2β)]​.
(2)
The prefactor comes from the normalization of the free-particle propagator; it cannot be dropped from a thermal trace.

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