Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 2 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge / 2013 / Paper 2 / 4 / ii

The integrand has simple poles at $z=ia$ and $z=-ia$. Only the first is inside the upper contour, and its residue isThe residue theorem therefore gives, for every $R>a$,On the upper semicircle, $|e^{iz}|=e^{-\mathrm{Im}z}\le 1$ and $|z^2+a^2|\ge R^2-a^2$. The estimation lemma bounds the arc contribution by $\pi R/(R^2-a^2)\to 0$. Hence the real-axis integral has the same limit, and taking its real part givesThe imaginary part vanishes independently because $\sin x/(a^2+x^2)$ is odd. The real integral converges absolutely, since the denominator grows quadratically.