Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-2-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2003/paper-1/5/b/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 2 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge 2003 Paper 1 5 b Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
Let . The commutation relation gives , so preserves the eigenspace of with eigenvalue . Because it is a nondegenerate eigenvalue, the eigenspace is one-dimensional, and for some real . This includes . Thus the eigenvectors of form a common eigenbasis, andWriting the corresponding unit-modulus eigenvalue of as givesThe pairing refers to the same common eigenvector; independent reorderings of the two real spectra would lose this information. The simultaneous diagonalization can also be constructed without requiring simple eigenvalues by diagonalizing within each eigenspace of .
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