Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 ib Paper 4 10E Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
A Hermitian matrix satisfies , where means conjugate transpose. If with , then is real, since it equals its complex conjugate . Thus every eigenvalue is real. To prove the finite-dimensional spectral theorem, choose a unit eigenvector ; one exists because the complex characteristic polynomial has a root. Its orthogonal complement is invariant, since for ,The restriction to that complement is again Hermitian. Induction on dimension supplies an orthonormal basis of eigenvectors, so for a unitary matrix .
In this basis, . Therefore . In that case the square root of a matrixis Hermitian, positive definite and satisfies . For uniqueness, any positive-definite Hermitian satisfying commutes with and hence preserves each eigenspace of . Its restriction to the -eigenspace is Hermitian, and its positive eigenvalues all solve . Thus that restriction is , forcing . This is the principal square root of a positive semidefinite matrix, here strictly positive definite.
Now let and . Expanding without assuming that and commute givesThe Hermitian matrix has because , whereas . Hence . If , , thenSince , every real eigenvalue of is positive. The positive-eigenvalue criterion now gives the strict finite-dimensional operator monotonicity of the square root:
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 1 1 a Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Use complex inner products linear in the first argument throughout. The spectral theorem for compact self-adjoint operators states that, for a compact operator on a Hilbert space, its nonzero spectral values are real eigenvalues, each of finite multiplicity, with no possible accumulation point except zero. Moreover,where are the mutually orthogonal eigenspace projections. The operator series converges in operator norm when the nonzero eigenvalues are listed in decreasing absolute value. The sum is at most countable, even if the kernel is nonseparable. Zero need not be an eigenvalue.
First prove that a nonzero compact self-adjoint operator has an eigenvalue of magnitude its norm, without assuming a spectral decomposition. Put and choose unit vectors with . Since , expansion givesCompactness of supplies a subsequence for which converges; the displayed estimate then forces itself to converge to a unit vector satisfying . The vectors and are eigenvectors for and , respectively, whenever nonzero, and they cannot both vanish. This proves the claim.
Self-adjointness gives reality of every eigenvalue and orthogonality of eigenspaces for distinct eigenvalues. An eigenspace for cannot contain an infinite orthonormal sequence: its images under would have pairwise distance , contradicting compactness. The same argument proves that there are only finitely many mutually orthogonal eigenvectors with eigenvalues of magnitude at least any given . Hence all nonzero eigenspaces together have a countable orthonormal basis, and their eigenvalues tend to zero if there are infinitely many.
Let be the orthogonal complement of the closed span of all these eigenspaces. It is invariant under . If were nonzero, the norm-attaining eigenvalue argument applied to that compact self-adjoint restriction would produce another nonzero eigenvector, a contradiction. Thus , and the converse inclusion follows from orthogonality. This establishes the asserted decomposition. On its orthogonal summands the tail of the operator series has norm equal to the supremum of the omitted eigenvalue magnitudes, proving norm convergence.
Finally, a nonzero complex number not among these eigenvalues has positive distance from their set and from zero. Inverting separately on the eigenspaces and kernel therefore gives a bounded inverse. This proves that no other nonzero spectral values occur and completes the theorem.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 1 1 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
For a finite-rank operator , define and its trace norm bywhere are its nonzero singular values, counted with multiplicity. The finite-rank spectral theorem gives orthonormal systems with , where .
For every bounded operator ,Choose the contraction taking to and vanishing on their orthogonal complement. It attains equality, soThis formula proves the triangle inequality and absolute homogeneity. Also , so vanishing of the trace norm forces . Thus it is a norm on the vector space of finite-rank operators.
The map , where , is a bounded linear map into the dual of this normed space. Its norm is at most . Rank-one tests give the reverse inequality: and , so taking unit vectors gives .
Conversely, let be a bounded linear functional for the trace norm. The sesquilinear form satisfiesThe Riesz representation theorem gives a unique bounded operator with , and . Since every finite-rank operator is a finite sum of rank-one operators, linearity implies for every . HenceThe same identification extends to the completion, the trace-class operators. This is trace-class duality; completeness of the original finite-rank space is not required to identify its bounded dual.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 1 1 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
For an orthonormal basis , define the Hilbert-Schmidt norm by . For a possibly uncountable basis, the nonnegative sum means the supremum over finite subsets. Parseval's identity gives, for any other orthonormal basis ,Changing the domain basis in the last expression proves basis independence. Polarization gives a basis-independent inner productwith the same first-argument linear convention. The sums converge by the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality. The operator-norm bound follows by applying Cauchy-Schwarz to the coordinates of a unit vector.
To prove completeness, let be Cauchy in this norm. The operator-norm bound gives a bounded-operator limit . For a finite subset of the basis,For large , the right side is uniformly small by the Cauchy property. Taking the supremum over shows is Hilbert-Schmidt and ; it also shows is Hilbert-Schmidt. Thus the Hilbert-Schmidt operators form a Hilbert space. Finite-rank operators are dense there: keeping finitely many basis columns makes the sum of omitted squared column norms tend to zero. The operator-norm bound then shows that every Hilbert-Schmidt operator is compact.
Now let be a strongly continuous unitary representation of the compact metric group , as is standard for a representation of a topological group. Fix and average the positive rank-one operator :The integrand is continuous in the Hilbert-Schmidt norm, so this Bochner integral exists in the complete space just proved. Normalized Haar measure and invariance show that is positive, compact and commutes with every . Moreover,the integrand is positive near the identity and every nonempty open set has positive Haar measure. Thus . A nonzero eigenspace is finite-dimensional and invariant under , by (a). Within it choose a nonzero invariant subspace of smallest dimension; it is irreducible. Its orthogonal complement is invariant because the representation is unitary, so the finite-dimensional space splits into irreducibles.
Take a maximal orthogonal family of such finite-dimensional irreducible invariant subspaces. If their closed span had a nonzero orthogonal complement, the same averaging argument on that complement would produce another member, contradicting maximality. ThereforeThis compact averaging of a rank-one operator argument does not require itself to be separable. Strong continuity is the topological representation hypothesis used in the averaging step.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 1 5 d Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Put . For a unitary operator, , soThis follows from the general identity . The averaging operators have and equal the identity on . On a vector , telescoping givesThe uniform norm bound extends this convergence to the closure of the range. Thus tends to identity on and to zero on its orthogonal complement. Consequentlywhich is exactly convergence in the strong operator topology. This proves the Von Neumann mean ergodic theorem in the requested unitary case.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 1 8 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
The polar decomposition of a bounded operator states that every bounded is uniquelywhere is a partial isometry with initial space and final space . Its initial and final orthogonal projections are and .
Existence of was proved in (a). For every ,Thus the map is well defined and isometric on . It extends uniquely to an isometry between its closed range and . Extend it by zero on to obtain . The equation and the projection assertions follow immediately. Any other normalized partial isometry with the same product must agree on the dense range of and vanish on its orthogonal complement, giving uniqueness. The kernel normalization is essential; without it an action on the kernel could be added.
A useful consequence for a Von Neumann algebra is that the polar factors of also belong to . The polynomial construction in (a) puts in the norm-closed algebra . For , the inverse of belongs to by a convergent Neumann series, andThese operators are contractions, since . On vectors the difference from has norm at most , and on the kernel it is zero. Density and the uniform bound prove the strong limit. Strong closedness of then gives . This justifies the use of algebra-valued polar factors in Question 7(c).
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 1 8 d Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
One implication is immediate: a unitary module equivalence makes each space an isometric copy of the entire other space, which is closed and invariant. For the converse, choose isometric intertwiners and supplied by the two embeddings. Their ranges are closed reducing subspaces. We construct the unitary, proving the Schröder-Bernstein theorem for Hilbert space modules in this setting.
Put , an isometric intertwiner of into itself, and let . The spaces , , are mutually orthogonal. For , applying the isometry relation reduces their inner product to one between and , which is zero. Henceis a closed reducing submodule of , and . Its orthogonal complement lies in , because it is orthogonal to . Combining these decompositions givesApply the inverse isometry on to obtainThe operatoris therefore an isometry onto : it is isometric on each orthogonal summand and their images are the two orthogonal summands just exhibited. Both pieces intertwine the action of , as do the projections onto and , so is a unitary module equivalence. This proves the reverse implication with no finiteness assumption on either module.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 23 2 i Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
For a compact Lie group, take any positive-definite Hermitian inner product on and average using probability Haar measure:It remains positive definite, because the integrand is positive for a nonzero vector, and translation invariance makes it -invariant. If is an invariant subspace, then is invariant too: when . Thus . Induction on dimension proves complete reducibility. This uses the usual continuous finite-dimensional representations of the compact group.
For a connected complex reductive algebraic group, representations are understood to be rational representations. Use a compact real form with . The structural construction takes a compact real form of the semisimple derived factor and the unit circles in the central torus, then passes through their finite central quotient. This is the compact-form structure of a complex reductive group, rather than an assumption that its given representation is already unitary.
The group is Zariski dense: the Lie algebra of its Zariski closure contains the complex span of , hence all of ; connectedness then makes that closure . Average over as above. The orthogonal complement of a -submodule is -invariant. Its stabilizer is a Zariski-closed subgroup, since preserving a fixed subspace is a system of algebraic matrix conditions. The stabilizer contains dense , so it is all of . This again gives an invariant complement to every submodule and provesIf reductivity is defined to allow finitely many components, first obtain a -equivariant projection . Average its conjugates over the finite component group. Since commutes with , the average is independent of coset representatives; it is -equivariant and remains the identity on . Its kernel supplies the required complement. Thus the result holds in that convention too.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 49 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
The commuting Hermitian operators admit a weight-space decomposition. The six root vectors shift their simultaneous eigenvalues byor their negatives. Put , and . The supplied relations giveThese are three sl2 triples, coming from the complexifications of the three SU(2) Lie algebra root-pair subalgebras. They act through homomorphisms into . For a nontrivial representation, simplicity of the SU(3) Lie algebra makes its kernel zero, so these images are actual subalgebras; a trivial representation gives zero actions. The real compact generators can be taken as , and .
Decomposing under any one of these subalgebras gives finite weight strings in its root direction. The two simple-root highest weights must be nonnegative integers. In the SU(3) highest-weight coordinates used here, this condition isHere are the Dynkin labels; are the eigenvalues of . An irreducible representation is determined by these labels and has dimension . An arbitrary finite-dimensional anti-Hermitian representation is a direct sum of such representations: the orthogonal complement of an invariant subspace remains invariant.
The weight diagram has Weyl group symmetry, namely reflections and rotations by degrees. Its convex boundary is a hexagon with alternating side lengths , degenerating to a triangle when one label vanishes. Generic representations need not have -degree symmetry. Boundary weight multiplicities are one. Moving inward through hexagonal layers increases multiplicity by one, up to ; triangular inner layers retain that maximum. An exact version of this rule is the dominant weight multiplicity formula for sl3: move a weight by the Weyl group to dominant Dynkin coordinates and setIts multiplicity is zero unless are integers, and otherwise is . These rules construct the diagram while counting coincident weights correctly.
For the Casimir calculation, set , , and for each root pair use and . In the defining representation these eight generators satisfy . Their summed squares are precisely the question's . The invariant trace form makes their structure constants of a Lie algebra antisymmetric, sothe antisymmetric coefficient contracts a symmetric anticommutator. Thus is a quadratic Casimir operator and is scalar on an irreducible representation by the Schur lemma.
Let be a highest-weight vector, annihilated by all . On , each vanishes and each reduces to the root commutator. Summing those three commutators gives . Henceand therefore the SU(3) quadratic Casimir eigenvalue isFor a reducible representation the same calculation applies separately to its irreducible blocks.
For light-hadron flavour symmetry, the up quark, down quark and strange quark form , and antiquarks form . Conventional mesons have . Conventional three-quark baryons haveobtained from , and . Their Dynkin labels are , and , respectively. Thus the conventional meson octet, baryon octet, baryon decuplet and singlet multiplets give , with the same values for conjugate antibaryon multiplets. More generally, the zero flavour triality of a light-quark hadron imposes on multiplets constructed entirely from light quarks, antiquarks and gluons. Their Casimir values are given by the same formula for these labels. Higher multiquark representations can therefore have other eigenvalues; the illustrated , of labels , has .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 iii Paper 17 1 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Choose the smooth fiber metric supplied by part (a), and let be orthogonal projection. These projections vary smoothly. Indeed, in a local frame of write its metric as a positive-definite matrix , and let the columns of be a frame of . ThenThe matrix is positive definite, so its inverse is smooth. This formula proves smoothness of the intrinsic projections in every chart. It also gives and .
The orthogonal complement is a smooth vector subbundle: applying to a complement frame gives a frame of its fibers, of constant rank , after shrinking the chart. Fiberwise,and the restriction is a smooth fiberwise bijective vector bundle morphism. In local frames its matrix is invertible, with smooth inverse, so it is a vector bundle isomorphism.
More explicitly, the desired orthogonal splitting of a vector subbundle isIts inverse is . Replacing by with leaves unchanged, so the inverse is well-defined. Both maps are smooth and linear on fibers, and their compositions are identities. The splitting exists globally but depends on the chosen fiber metric.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 iii Paper 19 1 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
An almost complex structure is a smooth real bundle endomorphism satisfying . In particular the real dimension is even, say . After complexifying, the type decomposition of the complexified tangent bundle isThe corresponding differential forms of type (p, q) are smooth sections of , regarded as alternating forms by the wedge product of differential forms. A form of type vanishes unless its arguments include vectors of type and of type .
Besides vanishing of the Nijenhuis tensor, two equivalent descriptions of an integrable almost complex structure are: the smooth sections of are closed under Lie bracket; and every point has complex coordinates in which is multiplication by , with holomorphic changes of coordinates. The equivalence with existence of these coordinates is the Newlander-Nirenberg theorem for smooth . A further equivalent condition is that the exterior derivative has only the two type components , with no components of bidegree or . Indeed evaluation of of a -form on two vector fields detects the component of their bracket; complex conjugation detects the other component.
For the almost complex structure induced by a complex atlas, write and put , . The differentials of holomorphic transition maps are complex linear, so these local definitions agree. In these coordinates has constant coefficients and all coordinate vector fields commute. The expression defining the Nijenhuis tensor is tensorial, so evaluating it on this frame proves it is zero everywhere. Thus the induced structure is integrable.
Here is a direct proof for the smooth submanifolds with invariant complex tangent spaces are complex assertion. At a point of , its tangent space is a complex-linear subspace, of real dimension . Make a complex-linear change of ambient holomorphic coordinates so that this tangent space is . Projection onto the first coordinates has invertible real differential on . The real inverse function theorem states that a smooth map between equal-dimensional manifolds with invertible differential is a diffeomorphism on sufficiently small neighbourhoods. It therefore writes locally as a smooth graph over an open set in .
A tangent vector to this graph is . Its image under is . Tangent-space invariance impliesso satisfies the Cauchy-Riemann equations. Smooth functions satisfying these equations are holomorphic: restrict to each coordinate complex line, use the one-variable criterion, and apply the iterated Cauchy integral formula on a small polydisc to get jointly holomorphic coefficients. Hence the graph parametrization is holomorphic. Restrictions of ambient holomorphic coordinates supply holomorphic transition maps between these graph charts. The restricted structure on is an integrable complex structure. This also proves the induced structure agrees with the original restriction, rather than merely producing some complex structure on .
A nonsingular analytic subvariety is a closed analytic subset which near each of its points is the zero set of a holomorphic submersion of constant rank; equivalently, it is locally a coordinate subspace in holomorphic coordinates. The holomorphic implicit function theorem says that if a holomorphic map to has differential of rank at a zero, its nearby zero set is a complex submanifold of codimension .
The homogeneous equation defines a subset of Complex projective space because multiplying a vector by multiplies its quadratic value by . Its gradient on is , which is nonzero for . More explicitly, in an affine chart set . If all derivatives of the restricted equation vanished at one of its zeros, all components of except possibly the th would vanish. The Euler homogeneous function theorem gives , forcing the remaining component to vanish as well. This contradicts invertibility of . The holomorphic implicit function theorem thus proves is a smooth complex surface.
To see its geometry, reduce the nondegenerate symmetric bilinear form to diagonal form over . There is a vector of nonzero self-pairing, since otherwise polarization would make the entire form zero. Normalize such a vector using a square root of its self-pairing. Its orthogonal complement remains nondegenerate, so induction gives an orthonormal basis. Apply the same argument to the nondegenerate form : the two forms are equivalent under an invertible linear change of variables. The allowed projective linear transformation therefore reduces toView its coordinates as the nonzero rank-one matrix . At , holding fixed and varying gives a projective line, and holding fixed and varying gives another. They are distinct and meet at . In fact these are the only lines through it: if a second rank-one matrix is , the entire pencil has determinant zero only if , so one projective factor is fixed. These are the two rulings of a smooth quadric surface.
The Segre embedding is the holomorphic mapEvery nonzero rank-one matrix has such a factorization, unique up to reciprocal rescaling, so is bijective. Its inverse is holomorphic on each open set where a matrix entry : the projective column recovers , and the projective row recovers . These formulas agree on overlaps. Thus the Segre description of a smooth quadric surface gives the promised stronger conclusion
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 iii Paper 19 5 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Let be the real Riemannian metric underlying the Hermitian metric, and let be the complex structure. The fundamental form of a Hermitian manifold isThe identity implies , so this is an alternating real two-form. Moreover . A two-form with this invariance has type : on two vectors of type , applying to both multiplies its value by , forcing that value to vanish; the same argument applies to type . Hence is a real -form.
Use the complex-linear convention for the complex Hodge star operator, extending the real star. The complex orientation and metric define , andHere the Hermitian inner product is linear in the first argument. With this convention, on the even-dimensional underlying real manifold the formal adjoints are , and . A conjugate-linear star is another convention, but then the adjoint formulas must change accordingly.
The Hodge Laplacian and Dolbeault Laplacian areAlso write . They are nonnegative, since for exampleThe requested Dolbeault Hodge decomposition on a compact Hermitian manifold is a compactness statement: on a compact Hermitian manifold without boundary,The harmonic space is finite-dimensional, and taking the harmonic representative induces an isomorphism . Compactness is essential to this formulation; it is not asserted on an arbitrary noncompact Hermitian manifold.
Now suppose is compact and Kähler, so . The permitted Kähler Laplacian identity is , making the three harmonic spaces identical in each bidegree. A -closed pure-type form has , since these two terms have different types. We will construct a Green operator potential for ddbar exactness, rather than invoking the ddbar lemma as the conclusion to be proved.
Let be the inverse of on the orthogonal complement of its harmonic forms, zero on the harmonic space. It is twice the Green operator of the Hodge Laplacian. The Hodge decomposition theorem and elliptic inversion give , with harmonic projection. It preserves bidegrees. The operators and commute with : the first follows from and , and the second directly from . They and their formal adjoints annihilate harmonic forms, so they preserve the orthogonal complement of the harmonic space. Consequently they commute with , by uniqueness of the inverse on the harmonic complement. Thus and are killed by both differential operators.
The assumed orthogonality makes . Applying the two Laplacians givesWe also need the mixed anticommutator, which follows from the permitted Laplacian identity rather than an extra unproved lemma. Expand using and . Since , its mixed terms sum to zero. Their two bidegrees and are distinct, so each vanishes separately, in particular . HenceWe have obtained the explicit answerThe positive assumptions on ensure these degrees are available. Conversely such a form is orthogonal to harmonic forms by integration by parts, so the same proof also explains the harmonic orthogonality criterion for ddbar exactness.
For injectivity of the Lefschetz operator on a Hermitian manifold on real one-forms, work at one point in a metric-orthonormal coframe with . If , a unitary change of coframe makes , . Thensince the displayed basis three-forms are linearly independent. Therefore has zero kernel. Injectivity on complex one-forms follows by taking real and imaginary parts, since is real. This pointwise proof of injectivity of powers of the Lefschetz operator for degree one does not require the hard Lefschetz theorem.
Closedness of gives . Using the permitted Kähler identities, specifically , givesMultiplying by two proves . In particular the Lefschetz operator preserves harmonic forms and the injective map on one-forms restricts to an injection . The de Rham Hodge theorem identifies these real harmonic spaces with the corresponding real cohomology groups. Taking dimensions yields
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 iii Paper 2 5 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Let have dimension over , with a nondegenerate alternating bilinear form . The symplectic group isIt acts freely and transitively on ordered symplectic bases. Choose the first vector in ways, then choose with in ways. Their span is nondegenerate, so choose the remaining symplectic basis in its orthogonal complement. This gives the recurrenceand therefore
For the permutation module with even, put andIt is invariant under coordinate permutations and has codimension one. The dot product restricted to is alternating because . Since the ambient dot product is nondegenerate, . Evenness of ensures , soHere the word symplectic must be understood as an alternating form before quotienting: a form with a nonzero radical is degenerate. The nondegenerate symplectic form is induced on , of dimension .
Now put . Coordinate permutations preserve the induced form and give a homomorphism . To see it is faithful for , suppose a permutation acts trivially on . For every pair of distinct indices,The two weight-two vectors could differ by only if the complement of a two-element set also had size two. For that is impossible. Thus preserves every two-element set, and hence fixes every index: intersect two such sets with one common element. ThereforeFor , both groups have order , and the injection is onto. This provesThe lower bound matters: for the action on the quotient has the Klein four-group as group homomorphism kernel. The construction is the deleted permutation module in characteristic two.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 iii Paper 6 3 ii Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Let be a four-dimensional symplectic vector space, with a symplectic basis . Its invariant inverse-form bivector may be chosen as . Put , so . Define a symmetric bilinear form on the six-dimensional exterior square byIt is symmetric because both factors have degree two. It is nondegenerate: in the six-element wedge basis, every pairs nontrivially with the wedge of the complementary pair and with no other basis vector. Since , the orthogonal complementhas dimension five and inherits a nondegenerate bilinear form. It is the primitive exterior square, equivalently the kernel of the symplectic contraction of an exterior square.
The symplectic Lie algebra preserves . It also preserves , since its elements have trace zero and the induced action on is multiplication by that trace. The exterior-power Lie algebra representation therefore preserves and , giving a Lie algebra homomorphismTo show injectivity, suppose acts as zero on . It already acts as zero on the invariant line , so it kills all of . For any basis , this meansIf , choose distinct from ; the coefficient of forces . Thus is diagonal. The same identity gives for every pair. Applying this to three distinct indices forces each diagonal entry to vanish. Hence and is injective.
Finally and . Injectivity between these equal-dimensional vector spaces gives surjectivity. Every nondegenerate complex symmetric bilinear form on a five-dimensional space is equivalent to the standard one. We have therefore constructed the exceptional isomorphism between sp4 and so5:
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2010 ia Paper 1 5A iii Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
Writing and using the Frobenius inner product, the three linear equations areThe first two differ by twice the third; equivalently . Thus there are only two independent constraints. Substituting gives , so every element of the vector subspace has the unique expressionThe two coefficient matrices satisfy all three constraints. Their linear independence follows by looking first at entry and then at entry . Therefore a basis for this orthogonal complement is
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2010 iii Paper 1 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Equip with the inner product defining the root system, so the Weyl group acts by orthogonal transformations. As usual, the root system spans its ambient space . Let be an invariant subspace for the reflection representation of a Weyl group. Its orthogonal complement is also invariant.
For a root , the Weyl reflection satisfiesIf for every , then . Otherwise choose with . Both and belong to , and their difference is a nonzero multiple of , so . HenceThe two sets are mutually orthogonal and individually closed under their root reflections. If both were nonempty, this would decompose into two orthogonal root systems, contradicting that it is an irreducible root system. All roots therefore lie in one of the two subspaces. Because they span , either or , the latter giving . Thus the reflection representation is an irreducible representation.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2010 iii Paper 1 4 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Let with its nondegenerate alternating bilinear form. Its inverse-form bivector is invariant under the symplectic Lie algebra, and . Choose . The exterior product defines a symmetric bilinear form on byIt is symmetric because two-forms commute under the wedge product. It is nondegenerate because each basis wedge pairs with its complementary basis wedge. Since , the five-dimensional orthogonal complementalso has a nondegenerate symmetric bilinear form. This is the primitive exterior square, equivalently the kernel of symplectic contraction of an exterior square.
Every element of fixes and preserves volume, since its trace is zero. The induced exterior-power Lie algebra representation consequently preserves and satisfies . Thus it gives a Lie algebra homomorphismWe check injectivity explicitly. If acts as zero on , it also kills , and therefore acts as zero on all of . For three distinct indices , the coefficient of in is , so all off-diagonal entries of vanish. Its action on is then . All these sums vanish, which in characteristic zero forces every diagonal entry to vanish. Hence .
Finally,The injective Lie algebra homomorphism is therefore surjective. Over , every nondegenerate symmetric bilinear form admits a basis in which its matrix is the identity, so this constructs the exceptional isomorphism between sp4 and so5:
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2010 iii Paper 17 5 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Let and be the two closed hemispheres of the sphere. Use as the clutching function between the trivial bundles on these hemispheres. The clutching construction definesThe projection to is locally a vector bundle. In a collar of the equator, extend the transition function by keeping it constant in the normal coordinate; this gives explicit vector bundle trivializations across the seam. Since the transition matrices lie in the special orthogonal group, the standard fiber orientations and Euclidean inner products agree on overlaps. Thus this is an oriented rank- vector bundle with a fiber metric.
For , choose a base point on the equator. A constant change of the negative hemisphere frame replaces by , so we may suppose . With the last standard unit vector, define the section obstruction for a clutched vector bundleThe crucial point is that a nowhere-zero section can be normalized using the fiber metric. It is then represented by continuous maps satisfyingon the equator.
If , the extension-null-homotopy criterion for a sphere extends to . Take this extension as and the constant map as . They glue to a nowhere-zero section.
Conversely, suppose such a section exists. Restricting a contraction of shows that is homotopic to a constant. The target sphere is path connected, so the constant can be moved to . Multiplying this homotopy pointwise by gives a homotopy from to . The first of these maps equals and extends over , hence is null-homotopic. So is null-homotopic too. A freely null-homotopic based sphere map represents zero in its homotopy group; any change of base point sends the zero class to zero. We have proved both directions:For , the same argument reads as the extension criterion for a two-point boundary and uses the trivial set when . For , the special orthogonal group is trivial, so the vector bundle is already a trivial vector bundle; the corresponding constant map to has zero obstruction. These cases require no higher homotopy group calculation.
If , then and the permitted vanishing of lower homotopy groups of a sphere makes . Normalize the resulting nowhere-zero section to a unit section , and setLocal orthonormal frames show that these orthogonal complements form a rank- vector bundle. The explicit vector bundle isomorphismhas inverse . Orient so that a positive frame followed by is positive in . This is splitting a trivial line from a nowhere-zero section and proves the oriented splittingFinally consider the special orthogonal sphere fibrationThe fiber over consists exactly of with . Near any unit vector, the Gram-Schmidt process continuously completes it to an oriented orthonormal frame, giving local sections of and local product fiber bundle charts. In particular has the homotopy lifting property.
Let be based and suppose . The composite is a based null-homotopic map by the given vanishing of . Lift a based null-homotopy of , beginning at , to a homotopy . The lift might initially move its base point , but always fixes . Right multiplication by corrects this: the homotopystill covers the same sphere homotopy, remains based, and starts at . At its endpoint every matrix fixes , so lies in the included . Thus every homotopy class in the target is represented by one from :This proves surjectivity of special orthogonal stabilization below the sphere dimension. For , this is the corresponding assertion about path components; the positive-rank special orthogonal groups are connected. The lifting argument also explains the zero term in the long exact sequence of homotopy groups of a fibration.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2010 iii Paper 62 6 a Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
An orthonormal multiresolution analysis consists of closed subspaces , , with , , , and the dilation equivalence . A scaling function has integer translates forming an orthonormal basis of . Henceis an orthonormal basis of . Set , the orthogonal complement of inside . A function whose integer translates form an orthonormal basis of produces a complete orthonormal wavelet system : different are orthogonal, their sum contains every difference , and density together with the zero intersection exhausts .
Here is the filter construction that guarantees such a wavelet. Nesting puts in , so expansion in its orthonormal basis gives the scaling refinement equation , with . Define the MRA low-pass filter and its complementary quadrature mirror filter bySplitting the orthonormal translates and Fourier periodization identity at , as in part (b), gives almost everywhere. Consequently the rows ofhave length one and are orthogonal; the matrix is unitary. Put and , so .
To see completeness as well as orthogonality, identify with its fine-scale coefficient sequences and take their Fourier series. Group the frequencies and over a half-period. The two rows of the displayed matrix are the normalized coarse and complementary channels; their unitarity is exactly an onto isometry from these two channels to the fine-scale coefficient space. Translates of and correspond to the Fourier basis in the respective channels. They therefore jointly form an orthonormal basis of . The orthogonal complement channel gives the wavelet completion of a multiresolution filter, namely the integer translates of span . This proves the asserted relation with an orthonormal wavelet.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2010 iii Paper 7 2 b Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Let be a finite-dimensional real or complex inner product space, and let be a unital subalgebra stable under the adjoint operator. Define its commutant of an operator algebra by . The double commutant theorem for star-algebras asserts . The inclusion follows immediately from the definition; we prove the reverse.
Write , fix a basis , and act diagonally on . The linear subspaceis invariant under every diagonal . Since is closed under adjoints, its orthogonal complement is invariant too: for , . Hence the orthogonal projection onto commutes with every diagonal .
Writing as an by block matrix , this says , so each . If , it commutes with every , and its diagonal action therefore commutes with and preserves . Because , . Therefore there is one such thatEquality on the basis gives , proving the theorem over either scalar field.
The identity hypothesis is necessary. For a possibly nonunital adjoint-stable subalgebra, adjoining the ambient identity does not change its commutant of an operator algebra, so the exact statement is . For example has on a nonzero . Thus the usual exam formulation takes the algebra to contain the identity.
