Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2012 iii Paper 78 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Suppress the common time factor and use the Fourier transform conventionA right Half-range Fourier transform is analytic above its convergence line and a left transform below it. For the limiting absorption principle with this time convention take , , , before taking . SetThis is the outgoing acoustic square-root branch: at a propagating real wavenumber, . Put and . Across the fluid part of , the field and its normal derivative are continuous; on the sheet both sides have the same normal velocity. The outgoing Helmholtz equation solutions therefore have equal normal derivatives and opposite scattered traces:The jump is supported on , and so is a minus transform.
The linear fluid equation and the sheet velocity imply on either face. The incident contribution to the left derivative transform is . Writing , it follows thatThe upward net pressure is lower minus upper, hence in transform space. If , the pinned endpoint givesCombining these identities gives the Wiener-Hopf equationThis is the plane-wave forcing of a pinned elastic half-sheet.
Let and assume initially that the distinguished points are distinct. Besides the branch points , has simple poles at . Its physical-sheet zeros solve the fluid-loaded dispersion relationFor real positive frequency there is exactly one positive real root : the left side increases strictly from zero to infinity on that interval. Equivalently, with , . Its other roots have negative real part and do not belong to this outgoing sheet. Continue with small absorption; lie below the real line and their negative partners above it. The Wiener-Hopf factorization assigns the lower branch cut and pole to , and the upper branch cut and pole to . The continued has a zero at , and at ; these are poles of their reciprocals, rather than poles of the factors. Branch cuts can be drawn away from the real line into the corresponding half-planes.
For this standard assignment a common strip of analyticity and nonvanishing isThe strip shrinks to the real contour as absorption is removed. The factors continue meromorphically beyond their designated half-planes; the allocation of the poles and branch points is part of the radiation condition. The incident pole belongs above the inversion contour. For incidence with the real contour is a direct choice. Other nongrazing angles are obtained by analytic continuation with the incident pole kept on its prescribed side, deforming the contour locally if necessary. Coincident distinguished points and grazing incidence are treated by the corresponding limits, not by dividing by a coincident pole.
Divide the Wiener-Hopf equation by and use pole subtraction in a Wiener-Hopf equation. With , the minus part of isIndeed these are exactly the incident-pole and upper bare-sheet-pole residues. At the lower bare-sheet pole , the forcing pole is canceled by the pole of before splitting. Thus is analytic on the plus side of the contour. The separated equation isWith the stipulated ,The scattered field is consequentlyThe full time-dependent density perturbation is the incident field plus . The two traces at follow by limiting from above and below. A constant rescaling of the two factors does not change this field.
To determine the endpoint slope, reconstruct the sheet transform using the fluid condition:At the continued has residue . Therefore the derivative transform generically has the lower-plane poleThis pole produces a forbidden incoming bare-sheet wave in the reconstructed displacement: travels towards the endpoint from . A minus transform of the specified outgoing solution must be analytic there. The incoming-pole cancellation at a pinned membrane edge is preciselyFor generic parameters this determinesThe lower pole is removed; the upper zero of can still produce the legitimate outgoing evanescent acoustic surface wave, whose phase travels to negative . This distinction separates the spurious bare-sheet wave from the coupled fluid-loaded mode. No explicit factorization has been used.