Nonsurjective isometry need not preserve midpoints Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-09-24
Surjectivity in the Mazur-Ulam theorem is essential. The mappreserves all distances and fixes zero, but it is not linear and does not preserve every midpoint.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2023 ii Paper 2 22F b Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-09-25
Here “isometry” is used in the standard Mazur-Ulam theorem sense of a surjective distance-preserving map. Surjectivity is needed; a merely distance-preserving embedding need not preserve midpoints, as shown by a nonsurjective isometry need not preserve midpoints.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2023 ii Paper 2 22F c Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-09-25
Assume . Applying midpoint preservation to and givesso . Consequently,Thus is additive. It follows successively that
An isometry is continuous. For any , choose rationals . ThenTogether with additivity, this proves that is real-linear. Hence the origin-fixing case of the Mazur-Ulam theorem givesfor all and .