Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-1-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2008/paper-2/16/b/ii/solution

For , is real symmetric. Sylvester's criterion says that all eigenvalues are positive exactly when its leading principal matrix minors are positive. These are , , and . Therefore
At either endpoint one eigenvalue is zero, so the strict positivity requirement excludes it.

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