Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 ia Paper 3 5E Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-05
Restrict the quotient projection to . This is a group homomorphism withIts image is a nontrivial subgroup of the prime-order quotient group, because is not contained in . By Lagrange's theorem for finite groups, the image has order and is all of . The first isomorphism theorem for groups therefore gives
For the second assertion, partition into conjugacy classes for . Because is normal, conjugation by permutes these smaller classes: . This group action is transitive since any two elements of are conjugate in . Elements of fix every -class, so the action factors through .
If is the number of smaller classes, the orbit-stabilizer theorem for this transitive action gives . ThusDistinct conjugacy classes are disjoint because they are orbits of a group action. This proves conjugacy class splitting in a prime-index normal subgroup without assuming all -conjugations are already conjugations by .