Past exam of the physics course of the year 1 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge / 2021 / Section B / 8 / a / Solution

The force law separates into two identical harmonic oscillator equations:For positive $m,k$, the general real solution isSince $\mathrm{Re}(e^{i\alpha })=\cos \alpha$ by Euler's formula, these are exactly the stated real parts of complex exponentials. The amplitudes $x_0,y_0$ and phases ${\varphi }_1,{\varphi }_2$ are fixed by the four initial position and velocity components. This is two-dimensional isotropic harmonic oscillator flow: the same angular frequency acts in every direction.