Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 2 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge 2003 Paper 2 1 Solution Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
For a vacuum electric potential, put in Laplace's equation in spherical coordinates. Multiplication by separates the radial and angular terms. With separation constant and , the angular Legendre differential equation isRegularity at both polar axes selects nonnegative integers and the Legendre polynomials. The radial equation is , whose independent solutions are and . Hence the angularly regular axisymmetric vacuum solution isThe radial domain and its boundary conditions determine which terms are admissible.
For the given charge density, only is forced. Write . The interior radial Poisson equation is . The identity for the Poisson equation with a spherical harmonic source gives the particular solution , since the radial operator takes to four. Finiteness at zero and decay at infinity therefore giveContinuity of the electric potential and its radial derivative at requires and . Solving gives , , soAll other angular modes have zero coefficients after imposing regularity, matching and decay. At the origin the interior expression is , which extends with a continuous gradient and value zero. The angular charge density has no unique value exactly at that point; Poisson's equation holds classically for and as a weak solution through the origin. There is no additional point charge.