Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-2-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2016/paper-1/5/c/i/solution

First, is invertible. If for a real vector, then , whereas the skew-symmetric matrix identity gives ; hence and . Thus its real kernel is trivial, which suffices for invertibility. The same argument applies to .
Using and the rule for the transpose of a product,
The factors and commute, as do the required inverses. Consequently
Thus . This is the Cayley transform of a real skew-symmetric matrix.

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