Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 329 1 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Let , , and . Applied forces and couples below are forces and torques on the solid; by force balance their values are also the strengths exerted by that solid on the fluid. This fixes the signs in Faxén's first law and Faxén's rotational law. To hold the passive sphere fixed, set its translation and angular velocity to zero in those laws. The incident two-mode tensorial squirmer flow givesOnly the stresslet part has vorticity:Consequently, for fixed as ,The leading force is the radial stresslet force. Its next correction, , comes from the incident potential dipole. The next correction, , contains both the swimmer's field and the Laplacian term in Faxén's first law. If the relevant coefficient vanishes, these next terms must be retained instead of calling the vanished term a nonzero leading approximation. Further exchanges in the method of reflections for Stokes flow are smaller still.
The passive sphere reflects primarily a Stokeslet with strength . At the swimmer, its velocity is . The unchanged surface slip velocity adds the free swimming velocity to the incident-flow contribution in Faxén's first law. ThusThe leading change is ; its next correction is the displayed term. Finite-radius Faxén's first law corrections, the passive sphere's reflected stresslet, and its rotlet contribute at order to translation.
For a Stokeslet at the origin,The curl of the first term is ; that of the second is also , before multiplying by . Hence . At the swimmer use displacement . The leading force is parallel to , so its Stokeslet has zero vorticity there. This eliminates the putative rotation. The potential dipole itself has no vorticity, but the holding force it induces is not radial. Applying Faxén's rotational law to its reflected Stokeslet yieldsThe passive sphere's rotlet and reflected stresslet can affect that last order, so they cannot restore the larger missing rotation. When , the boxed coefficient is zero and the higher-order terms determine any rotation.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 2 19I c iii Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
No, it cannot deformation retract onto a graph. Each sphere contributes a degree- homology class independent of the other two. Attaching circles at points introduces only vertices and edges, soFor example, the cellular chain complex obtained by giving each sphere one -cell and a tree of arcs has three zero-boundary -cells and no -cells. Every graph has zero degree- homology. A deformation retraction would induce a homotopy equivalence and an isomorphism on homology, which is impossible. An ordinary retraction has no such requirement.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 2 19I c ii Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
Yes, it retracts onto a graph. On each of the three spheres, choose an arc joining the two marked points. A sphere retracts onto this arc: identify it with the vertical meridian parameterized by the height coordinate, and send every point of a given height to the meridian point at that height. This map is continuous and fixes the meridian. Apply these three retractions and fix the lifted circles pointwise; the maps agree at all attachment points. The resulting connected graph has six vertices and nine edges, so its fundamental group is free of rank .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 2 19I c i Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
The kernel is a normal subgroup of index , so the corresponding connected covering space is regular with six sheets labeled by . Write , and use right multiplication for path lifting. Above the real projective plane, right multiplication by pairs the labels, giving three copies of its two-sheeted covering space . Each sphere has two marked antipodal points corresponding to its pair , . Above the circle, right multiplication by gives two cycles of length three. Attach their six marked points to the identically labeled points of these three spheres.
The six-sheeted cover: three spheres joined by two lifted circles
. Details. The upper circle follows ; the lower follows . The point paired with is , explaining the reversed lower labeling in the figure. On each summand these are genuine covering maps, and the attachment matches the six lifts of the wedge point. A small neighborhood of that point lifts to six disjoint copies of its neighborhood in the wedge. This verifies the covering space locally, and the action of is transitive, so it is connected. Its stabilizer is , identifying this kernel cover of a real projective plane wedged with a circle.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 2 21F Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
By the argument principle, the number of zeros minus poles, counted with multiplicity, in the fundamental parallelogram is . The logarithmic derivative is periodic with the same lattice, so the integrals over opposite sides cancel. Thus the numbers of zeros and poles are equal.
The Weierstrass elliptic function gives a degree-two map whose fibers identify and . An even elliptic function is constant on these fibers, so it descends to a single-valued function on the sphere. This is meromorphic even at a branch value: near a half-period the involution is , the Laurent series of has only even powers, and has a double zero and provides a local coordinate in . At the image of , gives the same conclusion at infinity. A meromorphic function on the Riemann sphere is a rational function, so .
A meromorphic antiderivative need not be elliptic. Take . Its double poles have zero residue, so integrating on the punctured plane gives a single-valued primitive, since every closed-contour integral is a sum of zero residues. The primitive extends meromorphically over each pole, with local principal part . If were elliptic, it would have precisely one pole modulo the lattice, with residue , contradicting the zero sum of residues in a fundamental parallelogram. This is a nonconstant counterexample satisfying the stated premise; the preceding descent proves that even elliptic functions are rational in the Weierstrass function.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 3 13C b Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
For the initially homogeneous sphere, and . Conservation of energy and the virial theorem imply , hence . With the usual homologous-sphere approximation, , soThese are the conventional collapse estimates. A final virial equilibrium is not, by itself, guaranteed to remain homogeneous: if , the actual relation is with . Thus the factor of two applies exactly to the gravitational radius, and to the outer radius only under the stated structural approximation.
Here “non-interacting” means collisionless apart from gravity. Baryonic gas can collide, convert ordered motion to thermal energy, and radiate it. If radiative cooling is effective, the fixed-energy virial state loses pressure support and contracts further. Baryonic cooling can destabilize the collisionless virial state; baryons are not inevitably unstable if cooling is slow or heating and pressure support maintain equilibrium.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 3 23I Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
The length of a curve is . Its arc length parameter is . Regularity gives , so the inverse function theorem gives a smooth inverse and has .
Reparametrize a length minimizer to constant speed on and use the energy functional . By Cauchy-Schwarz inequality, every competitor has , with equality for constant speed, so this parametrization also minimizes . For a fixed-endpoint variation with tangential vector field , differentiation and integration by parts giveThe boundary term is zero. Arbitrary smooth tangential of compact interior support are realizable by the stated variation fact. Taking to be a nonnegative cutoff times proves . Hence a length minimizer is a geodesic after constant-speed reparametrization. The original parameter need not be affine: arbitrary varying-speed parametrizations preserve length but have nonzero covariant acceleration. This qualification is necessary for the literal wording.
For distinct nonantipodal on the punctured unit sphere, there is a unique shorter great circle arc, of length . A minimizing curve exists exactly when that shorter arc avoids the removed north pole. If it avoids the pole it attains the spherical lower bound. If it passes through the pole, arbitrarily small smooth detours have lengths tending to , but equality would force the unique shorter arc, which is unavailable. Thus the infimum is not attained; the longer great circle arc is not a substitute minimizer.
For antipodal in the punctured sphere, one can choose a great circle semicircle avoiding the north pole; it attains length . Thus every admissible antipodal pair has a minimizer. If identical endpoints are included despite the earlier distinctness stipulation, the infimum is zero, but no smooth regular curve attains it; only a nonregular constant curve does.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 3 37B Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
Write and use repeated-index summation. Direct differentiation givesTracing yields . Since for , and , we getHence the incompressible Stokes equations hold everywhere outside the bubble.
The Newtonian viscous stress tensor simplifies toAt with , , so : the interface is impermeable in the bubble frame. Also is purely normal, so the tangential traction vanishes, appropriate to a clean bubble with negligible internal viscosity. The tangential fluid velocity need not equal the bubble's velocity. At infinity . The calculation assumes the usual spherical, negligible-deformation limit; exact normal-stress balance includes interior pressure, surface tension and any buoyancy sustaining the motion.
Integrate the outer-fluid traction with the normal pointing from the bubble into the fluid:Thus , smaller than the no-slip rigid-sphere Stokes drag law .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 4 20I b Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
Triangulate the sphere by the boundary complex of the cross-polytope with simplicial vertices : a face contains at most one simplicial vertex from each antipodal pair. Take its barycentric subdivision. Its simplicial vertices are the nonempty faces of the original complex, and its simplices are strictly nested chains .
Form a quotient complex whose simplicial vertices are pairs , and whose simplices are the images of these chains. No chain contains both and . Moreover a chain of face-orbits lifts uniquely up to simultaneous negation: after choosing a largest face, every smaller face has at most one representative contained in it, because an original face contains no antipodal simplicial vertices. Thus the quotient is an honest simplicial complex, without two different simplices with the same simplicial vertex set. Its realization is homeomorphic to the sphere modulo its antipodal action. This provides a triangulation of Real projective space . The subdivision avoids the duplicate-simplex problem of naively identifying simplicial vertices in the unsubdivided cross-polytope boundary.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 4 20I c Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
The antipodal map is the restriction to the boundary of the unit ball of on . The induced orientation on the sphere is reversed or preserved according to the determinant of that ambient linear map, namely . Its degree is therefore . With integral coefficients, for the induced top-homology map isAt , ordinary instead has its two generators exchanged; multiplication by is the statement on reduced . This distinguishes the small-dimension exception from the usual top-degree formula.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 4 20I d Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
Suppose such an exists. Orthogonality and unit lengths makea continuous map into the unit sphere, since its squared norm is one. This is a homotopy from the identity to the antipodal map. Their degrees would coincide, but for even they are respectively and , a contradiction. Thus no such continuous map exists for even . At there is not even a unit vector orthogonal to either point of , so nonexistence holds there as well. This is a sphere form of the Hairy ball theorem.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ii Paper 4 35D Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
Ignoring magnetization, electric polarization charge transport gives bound current . The assumed weak dielectric contrast therefore gives inside the sphere. This is the first Born approximation: the incident field supplies the electric polarization to leading order in .
For , the far-distance expansions are and . Substitute the retarded time into the phase in the Lorenz gauge vector potential. The phase becomes , so, using ,The assumptions and control amplitude and phase errors respectively. In the radiation zone the supplied electric and magnetic fields satisfy . Complex phasors therefore give the time-averaged radial Poynting flux . The incident flux is , soOrient spherical coordinates along to evaluate the form factor:ConsequentlyAt the bracket is interpreted by its limit , not a singularity. The transverse factor accounts for polarization of an electromagnetic wave; for complex polarization of an electromagnetic wave its squared norm means the Hermitian norm.
