Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-2-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2019/paper-2/8/d/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 2 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge 2019 Paper 2 8 d Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-18
No. The quaternion groupis another non-abelian group of order eight: for example while . Its multiplication comes from the associative quaternion algebra, so it does define a group.
It is not isomorphic to the dihedral group of the square. In , only has order two; the six elements have order four. The square's dihedral group has five elements of order two: four reflections and the half-turn. Group isomorphisms preserve element orders, so these groups are distinct. The hypothesis in part (c) excludes , since its only element of order two is already in each cyclic subgroup of order four.
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