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ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2003/ia/paper-1/7b/ii/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2003 ia Paper 1 7B ii Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
Place the cube's vertices at . Every symmetry fixes its centre, and permutes the three perpendicular pairs of face normals, so it is a signed permutation matrix. Conversely every such matrix preserves the cube. The symmetry group of a cube acts transitively on its eight vertices: independent coordinate sign changes take to any vertex.
A symmetry fixing must permute its three incident edges. This gives an injective map from its stabilizer subgroup into , since those three edge directions determine the linear transformation. All six permutations are realized by coordinate permutation matrices, which fix . Thus the vertex stabilizer has order six. The orbit-stabilizer theorem now yieldsThe use of all symmetries includes reflections as well as the twenty-four elements of the rotational symmetry group of a cube.
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