Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 2 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge / 2018 / Paper 2 / 4 / c / Solution

For a positively oriented simple closed contour, the residue theorem states that the integral of a function holomorphic on and inside the contour except at finitely many isolated interior singularities is $2\pi i$ times the sum of its residues. There must be no singularity on the contour.

Factor the denominator as $(z^2+z+1)(z^2-z+1)$. For $R>1$, the upper semicircle encloses the two simple polesThe other two poles are in the lower half-plane. Since $D^{\prime }(z)=4z^3+2z=2z(2z^2+1)$,Writing $h=\sqrt{3}/2$ and using $1/a=1/2-ih$, $1/b=-1/2-ih$, their numerator difference simplifies toThus for every $R>1$ the closed-contour integral isTo remove the arc, on $C_R$ we have $|e^{iz}|=e^{-\mathrm{Im}z}\le 1$ and $|z^4+z^2+1|\ge R^4-R^2-1$. For sufficiently large $R$, the complex line integral estimate givesThe real-line integral is absolutely convergent. Its imaginary part is zero by oddness of $\sin x/(x^4+x^2+1)$. Therefore