Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-1-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2006/paper-1/2/b/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 1 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge 2006 Paper 1 2 b Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
The upper-left block is a planar rotation matrix. Its real characteristic polynomial is , which is strictly positive for real because the angle excludes integer multiples of . Hence any real eigenvector has . The remaining equation is , givingThere are infinitely many nonzero solutions, spanning one independent eigenvector direction.
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