Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 2 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge / 2021 / Paper 2 / 9 / b / Solution

Rotations commute with one another, while reflection conjugation sends $R^j$ to $R^{-j}$. Thus the rotational conjugacy classes are pairs $\{R^j,R^{-j}\}$, except when the two entries coincide. For reflections, direct use of the relations givesIf $n$ is odd, multiplication by two permutes residues modulo $n$, so all reflections are conjugate. The complete class list isTheir sizes are $1$, then $(n-1)/2$ classes of size two, then one class of size $n$, giving $(n+3)/2$ classes and $2n$ elements in total.

If $n$ is even, the half-turn $R^{n/2}$ is central and forms its own singleton. Conjugation changes a reflection exponent by an even amount or negates it, so it preserves parity and reaches every exponent of that parity. The list isThere are $n/2+3$ classes; their sizes are $1,1$, then $n/2-1$ pairs, then two classes of size $n/2$. Geometrically the two reflection classes correspond to vertex-axis and edge-axis reflections, in either order depending on the choice of $m$. These are the conjugacy classes of a finite dihedral group.