Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 1 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge / 2017 / Paper 1 / 7 / a

Put $\theta =\pi /12$. The double-angle trigonometric identities imply ${\cos }^2(2\theta )=1-{\sin }^2(2\theta )$. Since $2\theta =\pi /6$ is in the first quadrant, the positive square root is required. The half-angle identities then give the requested expression in terms of $\sin (\pi /6)$: