Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematical-and-computational-biology-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2025/paper-2/6/e/solution

Factor the characteristic polynomial as . The eigenvalues, with algebraic multiplicity, are therefore
The adjacency matrix describes a star graph with node 1 as the hub. For the positive leading eigenvalue , write the hub component as . The leaf equations , for , give equal leaf components . The hub equation is , which is consistent precisely because . Thus an eigenvector is .
Normalizing its Euclidean norm to one gives the eigenvector centrality
Numerically this is . It satisfies both and . If “normalized” instead means maximum component one, use ; if it means components summing to one, divide by . The hub-to-leaf ratio is invariant under these conventions. The negative leading-magnitude eigenvalue also has an eigenvector, but its mixed signs do not define nonnegative eigenvector centrality.

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