Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2018 iii Paper 107 5 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
The Fredholm alternative for an elliptic Dirichlet problem and part (b) give an inverse of norm at most . ChooseOn the closed radius- ball , set . The stated inequalities giveandThus is a contraction mapping of the complete metric space into itself. The Banach fixed-point theorem gives , solving the required nonlinear elliptic boundary value problem. This small-data existence for a nonlinear elliptic Dirichlet problem also gives uniqueness within this small ball; it does not assert global uniqueness.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2018 iii Paper 107 5 d Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
Let , so has zero Dirichlet boundary condition. Using the supplied form of the minimal surface equation for a graph, setFor and , the difference bound impliesandThe shifted arguments stay in the permitted radius-two ball, and . The Laplacian with zero Dirichlet boundary condition has trivial null space by the maximum principle for harmonic functions. Choose small enough that and , for the constants in part (c) with . Its small-data existence for a nonlinear elliptic Dirichlet problem supplies , and solves the minimal surface equation for a graph with the required boundary values.