Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2008/ia/paper-3/2e/solution

The real orthogonal group and special orthogonal group are, under matrix multiplication,
An orthogonal matrix preserves Euclidean inner products; taking determinants of shows that its determinant is or . Its inverse is , so as well.
For , use . The determinant then satisfies
It follows that . Thus the real matrix has a nonzero vector in its kernel of a linear map, yielding
This is the three-dimensional case of odd-dimensional special orthogonal transformation has a fixed vector; geometrically it supplies the fixed rotation axis, unless the transformation is the identity and every direction is fixed.
The claim is false for . The matrix is orthogonal with determinant and has only the eigenvalue . It therefore has no nonzero eigenvector with eigenvalue .

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