Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-2-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2017/paper-1/5/a/solution

An matrix is diagonalizable over a chosen field exactly when it has a basis of linearly independent eigenvectors. Equivalently, is diagonal for some invertible . Distinct eigenvalues suffice but are not necessary. For example,
is not diagonalizable: its only eigenvalue is and its eigenspace is the one-dimensional span of . It is a nontrivial Jordan block.
A Hermitian matrix satisfies , where the dagger denotes conjugate transpose. If with , then
The denominator is positive real, so
For and , Hermiticity also gives
Thus
This is the necessary qualification to the PDF's orthogonality wording: arbitrary eigenvectors belonging to a repeated eigenvalue need not be orthogonal. Within each repeated eigenspace, Gram-Schmidt orthogonalization produces an orthonormal basis; together the eigenspaces give an orthonormal eigenbasis by the finite-dimensional spectral theorem. For example, and are nonorthogonal eigenvectors of the identity matrix.

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