Past exam of the quantum theory course of the University of Oxford / 2014 / 3 / a / iii

Let $a={\mathbb{E}}_{\psi }(A)$, which is real. The dispersion, or quantum uncertainty, is the nonnegative standard deviationIndeed, self-adjointness and normalization giveA squared norm is nonnegative, so the square root is defined. It vanishes precisely when $(A-aI)\psi =0$, namely when $\psi$ is an eigenvector of $A$. Conversely, an eigenvector with eigenvalue $\lambda$ has $a=\lambda$ and hence zero dispersion. Thus zero dispersion is equivalent to being an eigenstate.