A Lie group is a group which is a finite-dimensional smooth Hausdorff second-countable manifold, with smooth multiplication and inversion. For the special unitary group, consider the real vector space
The diagonal entries of a skew-Hermitian matrix supply real parameters, and the entries above the diagonal supply ; the trace-zero condition removes one real parameter. Thus .
The matrix facts used to construct charts are these: the matrix exponential is analytic, its derivative at zero is the identity, and it has an analytic inverse matrix logarithm on a sufficiently small neighborhood of the identity. On those neighborhoods , , and . For a unitary matrix in that neighborhood, the spectral theorem writes with principal angles close to zero, and is skew-Hermitian.
Choose a norm ball of radius small enough to lie in the exponential's inverse domain. If is unitary, and in operator norm, then
so its trace is zero. Conversely gives and . Thus the logarithm identifies an open neighborhood of in , with its matrix subspace topology, with the open ball . Choosing a real linear identification turns this into a chart.
For every take the translated chart
Their overlap maps are wherever both charts are defined, so they are real analytic. They cover the group; the matrix topology is Hausdorff and second-countable. This constructs the real manifold directly, rather than merely counting equations. Matrix multiplication is polynomial in real/imaginary entries and inversion here is ; in the logarithm charts both are smooth. The logarithm charts for the special unitary group therefore prove
For it is the one-point group of dimension zero.
For , let the first column be , of unit norm. Every unit vector orthogonal to it is a scalar of modulus one times . The determinant of the resulting matrix is that scalar, so determinant one fixes it to . Hence
is bijective, with inverse given by taking the first column. The forward map is real polynomial in the four coordinates; composing with the local logarithm charts verifies smoothness into the constructed manifold. The inverse is a smooth matrix-coordinate projection and, in the usual embedded sphere charts, is smooth into . Thus , the explicit realization of SU(2) as the three-sphere.
Use logarithms to base two, so all entropies are in bits. For a discrete probability distribution and a density operator with eigenvalues , the Shannon entropy and Von Neumann entropy are respectively
Use . The second definition is basis-independent by the spectral theorem; for a density operator diagonal with probabilities , it agrees with the first.
The classical relative entropy, or Kullback-Leibler divergence, of from is
It is if some has . The quantum relative entropy is
when the support of is contained in that of , and is otherwise. Matrix logarithms are taken on the corresponding positive supports. In a common eigenbasis this reduces to classical relative entropy; both divergences are nonnegative and are generally asymmetric.
To prove Fano's inequality, let the finite alphabet size be and let indicate an incorrect guess. Since is determined by , the chain rule for conditional entropy first gives
Expanding in the opposite order gives
Conditioning reduces entropy, so , the binary entropy function. When , knowledge of determines and the conditional entropy is zero. When , can lie in at most the alphabet values other than . Entropy on values is at most : its deficit from that number is the nonnegative relative entropy from the uniform distribution. Averaging the two cases therefore gives
Combining the two expansions proves
This proof of Fano's inequality via an error indicator works for any alphabet-valued guessing rule, not just an optimal one. If , there is no guessing uncertainty and the claim is simply ; that case is treated separately rather than writing .
By the spectral theorem, write , where is orthogonal and each . Choose the whitening transformation
A linear image of a multivariate normal vector is multivariate normal, and . Thus are independent random vectors. Their whole joint distribution is independent of .
Define and . These satisfy
Therefore
The right side is a function of independent standard multivariate normal observations only, so its distribution depends on but not on . This is the same affine invariance of Hotelling's statistic that permits multivariate mean tests with unknown covariance. The proof concerns the jointly transformed mean and covariance; whitening the mean alone would not establish the conclusion. Inverses exist almost surely under . If is singular, no square matrix can whiten it to , so nonsingularity of the population covariance is necessary as well.
A compatible almost complex structure is a smooth endomorphism satisfying , preserving , and making a positive-definite inner product. Preservation and make this bilinear form symmetric.
To construct one, choose any Riemannian metric and define by . The endomorphism is skew-adjoint and invertible. Consequently is positive definite and self-adjoint. Let be its positive square root and set
The spectral theorem gives fibrewise, and the positive-square-root operation is smooth on positive-definite matrices, so this defines a smooth endomorphism. Since commutes with , . Also , so . Commutation then gives
This is the metric construction of a compatible almost complex structure, proving nonemptiness.
If we start with for an already compatible , then , so , , and the construction recovers . For two compatible structures, linearly interpolate their metrics,
and apply the construction to . This is a continuous smooth-in- path with endpoints . Thus the space is nonempty and path connected. Interpolating instead to a single fixed auxiliary metric actually gives the contractibility of compatible almost complex structures.
Choose an orthonormal basis of eigenvectors of the positive-definite operator using the proved spectral theorem. Its eigenvalues are strictly positive, because . Define . It is a positive-definite Hermitian operator and , establishing existence of the positive square root of an operator.
For uniqueness, let be any positive-definite Hermitian square root. The identity implies , so preserves each eigenspace of . Its restriction to that space is Hermitian and positive-definite. Diagonalize that restriction by the same spectral theorem. Every resulting eigenvalue satisfies and , hence . Therefore acts as on the entire eigenspace, even when is repeated. These eigenspaces span the space, so the positive-definite Hermitian square root is unique, with eigenvalues .
For a Hermitian operator , every eigenvalue is real. Indeed, if with , self-adjointness gives . To prove the finite-dimensional spectral theorem, proceed by induction on the dimension. The fundamental theorem of algebra supplies a root of the characteristic polynomial, hence a unit eigenvector . Its orthogonal complement is invariant: for , . The restriction of to that complement is again Hermitian. Induction supplies an orthonormal basis of eigenvectors there; adjoining gives an orthonormal eigenbasis of the whole space. The zero-dimensional case is immediate. Consequently a Hermitian operator is diagonal in an orthonormal basis, with real diagonal entries.
A spatial finite difference method and time discretization for a linear evolution problem give a recurrence . To obtain numerical stability on , one needs a bound uniform in the permitted grid sizes and time steps. More generally a growth estimate is sufficient. The finite-time stability versus power boundedness distinction matters: growth per step of can be compatible with the latter finite-time estimate, whereas unrestricted geometric growth at a fixed Courant number is not.
The eigenvalue method diagonalizes into modes. If is a normal matrix, the spectral theorem gives . Thus gives contraction, and gives the preceding growth estimate. A diagonalizable matrix has , so its condition number must remain bounded uniformly as the mesh changes. A stable-looking list of eigenvalues alone is insufficient.
Indeed,
Both eigenvalues are one, but the Jordan block gives growth proportional to , violating uniform finite-time numerical stability. A nonnormal Fourier amplification matrix can similarly exhibit large amplification even with its eigenvalues inside the unit disk. Eigenvector conditioning and the full powers of the amplification operator are essential.
For constant-coefficient schemes on a periodic or infinite grid, a Fourier transform diagonalizes scalar translation-invariant stencils. This yields von Neumann stability analysis using the Fourier amplification symbol . The discrete Parseval identity turns a bound on into a discrete L2 norm estimate. For systems, the symbol is a matrix; a uniform power bound for matrix Fourier symbols is required, rather than a bound on its spectral radius alone.
For the heat equation, a central finite difference in space and the explicit Euler method in time give
The scalar condition for every frequency is exactly . With zero Dirichlet boundary conditions, the spatial matrix is symmetric and diagonalized by sine modes, leading to the same uniform sufficient restriction. By contrast, the Backward Euler diffusion scheme has and is stable for every .
For the advection equation , , centered space with the explicit Euler method gives , , and . At fixed positive Courant number, repeated powers are unbounded as the mesh is refined. The upwind finite difference scheme instead has
which gives contraction precisely for . This comparison shows why the spatial stencil and time method must be analyzed together.
Boundary treatment can destroy the normality or mode decomposition available on a periodic grid, so a finite-interval scheme needs its own uniform operator estimate. Multilevel time schemes likewise require the root condition for a multistep method and uniform bounds for the associated amplification matrices; simple scalar root tests do not establish these bounds for arbitrary systems. Once consistency of a numerical method, a well-posed linear evolution problem and the required numerical stability estimate hold, the Lax equivalence theorem gives numerical convergence. Eigenvalues provide a powerful route to that estimate when the accompanying eigenvector and boundary analysis is justified.
For a positive operator , the spectral theorem writes with . Hence its unique positive square root of an operator is . Conjugating this spectral decomposition shows for a unitary operator .
Let and . Then and . The square-root covariance and the cyclic property of the trace give
For the quantum fidelity, covariance first gives . Therefore
Apply the same square-root identity and the cyclic property of the trace to obtain
Thus unitary invariance of trace distance and fidelity gives
The same acts on both quantum states: these quantities depend on the relative distinguishability of the quantum states, not on a choice of basis.
For take the diagonal maximal torus
The spectral theorem for unitary matrices says that every element is conjugate to an element of . A diagonal element with pairwise distinct eigenvalues has centralizer exactly . Its conjugates therefore determine its eigenvalues up to permutation, and the normalizer quotient is . The character lattice of a torus is , with . Conjugation on the matrix unit has weight , so these are the roots. Choose positive for ; then
Dominant integral weights are precisely the integer tuples . Negative entries are allowed: they correspond to determinant twists, so polynomial representations alone do not exhaust the irreducible representations of .
Normalize Haar measure on and to have mass one, and put
The Weyl integration formula for U(n) for a continuous class function is
For a general continuous function, replace in the torus integral by , using the normalized invariant quotient measure.
To prove the formula, consider the conjugation map , . On regular torus elements its fibres have exactly points: the possible orderings of the distinct eigenvalues. Equip the group with an invariant inner product on its Lie algebra and split . After translating the derivative back to the identity, its torus directions contribute the identity, while its transverse directions contribute . Each pair supplies a real two-dimensional off-diagonal plane. On that plane is multiplication by , regarded as a plane rotation, so the absolute real determinant of the transverse derivative is
The change-of-variables theorem, divided by the covering multiplicity, now gives the desired weighted integral up to the constant relating the normalized invariant measures. The nonregular locus has measure zero: repeated eigenvalues are the zero-set of the nonzero discriminant, and the torus coincidence sets likewise have measure zero. Thus its omission causes no change to the integral. To determine the normalization, expand as a sum of distinct torus characters. Fourier orthogonality gives . Applying the formula to fixes the coefficient to . This proves both the class-function and conjugacy-averaged forms.
We can now derive the character formula from integration, rather than merely quote it. Use the basic highest-weight theorem: a finite-dimensional irreducible representation has a unique highest weight with a one-dimensional highest-weight space; all its other weights are minus a nonnegative sum of positive roots. Its character is Weyl invariant. Also, character orthogonality for compact groups gives . This orthogonality follows by averaging the representation on : the integral projects onto intertwining operators, whose dimension is one by the Schur lemma.
Let and, for a strictly decreasing integer tuple , put . The finite Laurent polynomial is alternating. Every alternating Laurent polynomial is a linear combination of the : collect its monomials by permutation orbits, and observe that an orbit with repeated exponents has zero coefficient by antisymmetry. Different are orthogonal on and each has squared norm .
The coefficient of in is exactly one. Indeed, a contribution from the term would require a weight in . For , the vector is a nonzero nonnegative combination of the positive simple roots, so that weight lies above and is impossible. The identity permutation supplies the highest-weight coefficient one. Consequently
Apply the integration formula to . Torus orthogonality gives
All the other coefficients vanish, proving
The quotient extends across repeated eigenvalues because its product with the denominator is the already defined continuous character. Equivalently, alternant divisibility makes it a Laurent polynomial invariant under permutations; multiply by a determinant power if negative exponents must first be removed.
Finally, is fixed by the Weyl group, so its common factor cancels in the quotient. Since , the determinant expression is exactly
Using in the derivation avoids treating a possibly half-integral as an actual character of the torus. At the identity, taking the leading Vandermonde term of the two determinants gives the accompanying dimension formula
Because is a real symmetric matrix, the spectral theorem gives . For , the Neumann series satisfies
Let be the initial infected count. Since its entries are indicator random variables, , while . The Cauchy-Schwarz inequality and the operator norm bound yield
Thus a sufficient asymptotic condition for a small outbreak is
For example, it holds when and for a fixed . For any fixed , the Markov inequality then gives
This is the spectral condition for a small discrete SIR outbreak. A uniform gap and few initial infections are needed for this conclusion; the finite-population condition alone does not control an asymptotically vanishing gap or an initially macroscopic infected set.
For , define the Adjoint representation of a Lie algebra by . The Jacobi identity gives, for every ,
Thus preserves brackets and is a Lie algebra representation. Its Killing form is
Using the representation identity and the cyclic property of the trace,
The Killing form is also symmetric by cyclicity.
In a basis , write . The lowered structure constants satisfy
The first expression is antisymmetric in and the second in . These transpositions generate all permutations, so is totally antisymmetric.
An invariant subspace of under its Adjoint representation of a Lie algebra is exactly an ideal of a Lie algebra: . A simple Lie algebra has no nonzero proper ideal, proving the adjoint representation is irreducible.
Put . The same trace calculation proves invariance of the Trace form of a Lie algebra representation:
Because the are anti-Hermitian, is a real symmetric bilinear form. The Killing form of a simple compact Lie algebra is negative definite. Define a real linear map by . Invariance of both forms implies that commutes with every , while symmetry makes self-adjoint for the positive inner product . By the spectral theorem, its real eigenspaces are invariant under the Adjoint representation of a Lie algebra. Irreducibility forces a single eigenvalue, so and . This also avoids the extra care needed when applying the complex form of the Schur lemma to a real vector space.
The kernel of is an ideal of a Lie algebra. It cannot be all of : a trivial representation of dimension greater than one is reducible. Simplicity therefore makes faithful. For every nonzero ,
Hence the positive trace index for a compact simple Lie algebra gives
in the adapted basis.
For the cubic trace tensor of a Lie algebra representation, the identity
expands to
Set , , , . Cyclicity of converts to and to . Thus the invariance identity for a cubic trace tensor is
For the final contraction, it is important to keep the specified index-raising convention. In the adapted basis write . Then , while raising the last two indices with gives . Total antisymmetry and the definition of the Killing form imply
Only the antisymmetric part of in contributes, so
Consequently the Killing-normalized contraction of a cubic trace tensor is
The negative sign printed in the last requested identity is incompatible with raising indices by the inverse Killing form. The opposite sign is obtained if one instead defines the lowered structure constants using the positive Euclidean metric, a different convention from the one specified.
For a concrete check, take the two-dimensional representation of with , where the are Pauli matrices. Then
Their contraction is , confirming the positive sign with and providing a counterexample to the printed sign.
Two finite-dimensional Hermitian matrices are related by unitary conjugation if and only if they have the same multiset of eigenvalues. Necessity follows because conjugation preserves the characteristic polynomial; sufficiency follows by mapping orthonormal eigenbases in the spectral theorem. Consequently
and no member of the first pair is equivalent to a member of the second. For an explicit example, the Hadamard gate gives and . Multiplying by a scalar phase does not change either conjugation.
Let and . The Richardson iteration gives
By the spectral theorem, a real symmetric positive definite matrix has an orthonormal eigenbasis with positive eigenvalues . The error in the th eigenvector direction is multiplied by . Thus convergence for every initial vector occurs exactly when for every , or . Since ,
Necessity also follows from an initial error in an offending eigenvector direction. At it remains unchanged; at the largest-eigenvalue error alternates sign; outside the interval some error does not decay. Hence neither endpoint can be included.
A unitary family with the required Weyl relations is
Translations preserve the norm and the multiplier has modulus one. Multiplication of two such operators leaves the phase after extracting , proving the relation. Translation and modulation are strongly continuous, first on compactly supported smooth functions by direct estimates, then on all of by density and unitarity.
If a bounded operator commutes with all , it commutes with translations and every modulation . The spectral theorem for the multiplication coordinate therefore makes it commute with all bounded multiplication operators and interval projections. One can see its form directly: on a finite interval , set . For bounded supported in , commutation gives . Testing characteristic functions shows almost everywhere. On increasing intervals these functions agree on overlaps and yield a single with .
Commutation with translations says almost everywhere for every . Convolving with a smooth approximate identity produces smooth functions invariant under every translation, hence constants. Passing to the local limit makes constant almost everywhere. Therefore is a scalar operator, and the unitary family acts irreducibly.
Principal component analysis replaces correlated measurements by uncorrelated linear compounds ordered by decreasing variance. Keeping the leading compounds gives a low-dimensional summary that preserves as much variance as possible under orthonormal projection. It is an unsupervised description of variation, rather than a guarantee that the high-variance directions are best for classification or prediction.
Write . For a unit loading vector , the variance of is . The spectral theorem gives an orthonormal eigenbasis with eigenvalues . If and , then
Equality is attained at . Requiring the next loading to be orthogonal to the first excludes its eigendirection, so the same argument gives and variance , and continues inductively. Repeated eigenvalues permit any orthonormal basis of the tied eigenspace. These are the population principal components.
With , set . Then
In particular the components are uncorrelated. They need not be independent unless, for example, is multivariate normal. Finally
The trace equality follows from and cyclicity of trace, so the rotation preserves total variance. The explained variance of a principal component is its eigenvalue divided by this total.
The SU(3) Lie algebra is the compact real algebra of traceless skew-Hermitian matrices; its complexification is , a special linear Lie algebra. In an antihermitian Lie algebra representation, the two commuting Cartan operators are Hermitian matrices, and the root operators satisfy . Thus the spectral theorem gives an orthogonal weight-space decomposition
A weight diagram plots the pairs , recording the weight multiplicity at each position. One point need not represent only one state. The commutators with give the roots of a root system
The raising operators move a nonzero weight vector by and the lowering operators move it by . These six root directions form the A2 root system. Each root and its negative generate an SU(2) representation ladder; in particular the pairs with Cartan operators and constrain the two simple-root strings.
Choose a linear functional positive on the three positive roots. A maximal weight for this ordering is killed by every raising operator. In an Irreducible Lie algebra representation it generates the entire representation by lowering, and its weight space has dimension one. The two SU(2) representation strings show that its Dynkin labels are nonnegative integers:
Conversely, each such pair specifies exactly one finite-dimensional irreducible highest-weight representation. Write it as . The fundamental weights in these Cartesian coordinates are and , so
The dimension follows from the three positive-root factors in the Weyl dimension formula: , , and . The complex conjugate representation is , with every weight negated. The SU(3) highest-weight coordinates here use as Dynkin labels, not as the plotted Cartesian coordinates.
The weight diagram is invariant under the Weyl group, generated by reflections perpendicular to the two simple roots; its convex hull is the orbit polygon of the highest weight. For it is a point, the trivial representation. If exactly one of is zero, the polygon is an equilateral triangle, with opposite orientations for and . Its edge has root steps. If , it is a hexagon with alternating edge lengths root steps; it is regular precisely when . The diagram contains the lattice points in that polygon belonging to the coset root lattice. A point in a different weight lattice coset is not a weight merely because it lies inside the polygon.
The shell multiplicities in an SU(3) weight diagram can be stated geometrically. The outer boundary has weight multiplicity one. Removing it leaves the orbit polygon for on the same lattice coset, with every surviving multiplicity reduced by one. Repeating increases the actual weight multiplicity by one at each inward layer until the smaller label reaches zero. The remaining triangular region then has constant multiplicity ; when it is just the central point. A triangular weight diagram has multiplicity one everywhere. Thus , the adjoint representation of SU(3), has six root weights of multiplicity one and two independent zero-weight states; has an outer shell of multiplicity one and an inner triangle of multiplicity two; has twelve outer states, six positions of multiplicity two, and a central position of multiplicity three. The total is . The dominant weight multiplicity formula for sl3 is an algebraic expression of the same rule.
Figure 1.
Triangular and hexagonal SU(3) weight diagrams, with each weight-space dimension shown at its point
. Details.
For a tensor product of Lie algebra representations, the Cartan operators add. Consequently its tensor-product weight diagram has weights and multiplicities
Geometrically, place a copy of the second weight diagram at every weight of the first, multiplying and adding coincident multiplicities. Because the representation is antihermitian, invariant subspaces have invariant orthogonal complements. To decompose the product, select a maximal remaining dominant weight, identify its irreducible highest-weight representation, subtract that representation's whole diagram with its weight multiplicities, and repeat. This highest-weight character subtraction must exhaust every weight, not merely the corners. Unlike the Clebsch-Gordan decomposition for SU2, an SU(3) product may contain repeated copies of an irreducible representation.
The two three-dimensional Fundamental representations of sl3 are and . In , the largest weight is , giving the six-dimensional triangle ; subtracting it leaves the reversed three-dimensional triangle . The first summand consists of symmetric tensors and the second of antisymmetric tensors. In , the weight sums give the six roots once and weight zero three times. Subtracting the octet, whose zero weight has multiplicity two, leaves a singlet. Hence the octet and singlet in a fundamental SU3 tensor product and the two-quark product are
The first dimensions are , and the second are . Next has highest weight , giving . Subtraction leaves one . Together with , this proves the tensor cube of the defining SU(3) representation:
The decuplet is fully symmetric in the three factors, the singlet fully antisymmetric, and the two octets have mixed permutation symmetry.
For the quark model, the relevant approximate flavour symmetry rotates the three light quarks in the fundamental . The up quark, down quark, and strange quark basis states have the weight diagram of the defining SU(3) representation. In physical coordinates define isospin and flavor hypercharge . Then
The last row follows from the Gell-Mann--Nishijima formula , in units of the positive elementary electric charge. The antiquarks transform in and have the negatives of these additive quantum numbers. Each quark has baryon number ; the strange quark has strangeness , while have . Thus , distinguishing flavor hypercharge from electroweak hypercharge. The Weyl group geometry is equilateral in ; using rescales the vertical coordinate.
A conventional meson has valence content , so its flavour symmetry gives a meson octet and a singlet. For the light pseudoscalar mesons, the octet contains the pions at with isospin , the kaons at , their antiparticles at , and the Eta octet state. The central weight multiplicity two is realized by
The orthogonal eta singlet state is . The eta and eta prime mesons are mixtures of , rather than exact octet and singlet mass eigenstates; this gives the pseudoscalar meson nonet. A different spin coupling of the same flavour product gives the vector mesons, again an octet and singlet, including the , , and neutral mixtures. The lowest orbital states have and respectively.
A conventional baryon has three valence quarks, so the tensor-cube decomposition supplies the flavour possibilities. The observed lowest baryon octet has spin and positive parity. Its isospin rows are : the nucleons , the three Sigma baryons, the Lambda baryon, and the two Xi baryons. The central states and have the same weight but different total isospin; this is the physical meaning of the octet's central multiplicity two. The spin-, positive-parity baryon decuplet is the triangle with rows
The Delta baryons form its top row, and the Omega baryon is the bottom state. All ten weights have multiplicity one. Their electric charges follow directly from the Gell-Mann--Nishijima formula; for example has , so , and has , so .
The two algebraic octets do not mean that two independent ground-state octets must occur. A three-quark colour singlet has a completely antisymmetric colour wavefunction. For a symmetric spatial ground state, the Pauli exclusion principle therefore requires a symmetric combined spin-flavour wavefunction. The symmetric flavour decuplet pairs with symmetric spin ; mixed flavour octets pair with mixed spin in one symmetric combination. Equivalently, the symmetric spin-flavour SU6 representation has
The three-quark flavour singlet is the antisymmetric combination. For a spatially symmetric ground state it would require an antisymmetric spin state of three spin- particles, but . The Pauli constraint on three-quark flavour multiplets thus excludes it from this ground-state sector; orbital excitation permits other multiplets.
Finally, this flavour symmetry is approximate: the unequal light-quark masses, especially the larger strange-quark mass, and electromagnetic interactions split masses within the multiplets and permit octet-singlet mixing. The weight diagrams classify flavour states, rather than asserting exact equality of their masses. Colour SU(3) is a separate gauge action on each flavour and supplies the colour-singlet constraint; it is not the approximate flavour action used in the eightfold way. The light conventional mesons organize into flavour octets and singlets, while the spatial ground-state three-quark baryons form one spin- octet and one spin- decuplet.
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 matrix
is 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 gives
The Hermitian matrix has because , whereas . Hence . If , , then
Since , every real eigenvalue of is positive. The positive-eigenvalue criterion now gives the strict finite-dimensional operator monotonicity of the square root:
Use the nonnegative Laplacian convention and on the unit sphere. In polar coordinates the Euclidean Riemannian metric is , its volume form is , and therefore the Laplacian in polar coordinates is
Consequently the required restriction identity is
For the opposite sign convention all eigenvalues below change sign, and the restriction identity changes accordingly.
Let be the vector space of degree- homogeneous polynomials in variables, and let be its subspace of harmonic polynomials. Write for . Substitution in the Laplacian identity gives
Thus each restricted harmonic polynomial is a spherical harmonic with eigenvalue .
To count these spherical harmonics, give polynomials the Fischer inner product . Multiplication by is adjoint to , so multiplication by is adjoint to the ordinary signed Laplacian . In these finite-dimensional inner product spaces, the orthogonal complement of is exactly . Hence the Fischer decomposition is
Multiplication by is injective, while restriction of a homogeneous polynomial to the sphere is injective: homogeneity recovers its value at every nonzero point. Counting monomials now gives the eigenvalue multiplicity
where the second term is zero for .
It remains to establish that these are all the eigenvalues and their full multiplicities. Iterating the Fischer decomposition expresses every restricted polynomial as a sum of the restricted harmonic polynomials. Restricted polynomials separate points and contain the constants, so the Stone-Weierstrass theorem makes their span dense in continuous functions on the sphere, hence dense in its L2 space. The Laplace-Beltrami operator is self-adjoint, and the distinct numbers strictly increase for . Its different eigenspaces are therefore orthogonal. Any additional eigenfunction, or any additional vector in one of these eigenspaces orthogonal to its known spherical harmonics, would be orthogonal to a dense subspace and hence zero. The standard compact elliptic spectral theorem then shows that the spectrum of the round sphere is precisely with multiplicity . For this gives multiplicity one at zero and two at for . If the degenerate case is included, has two points and its Laplacian is zero on a two-dimensional function space.
The Schmidt decomposition theorem says that a normalized vector in the tensor product of two finite-dimensional Hilbert spaces can be written
where both families are orthonormal. The numbers are its Schmidt coefficients. The Schmidt rank and coefficients, including multiplicities, are uniquely determined by the state; the local vectors may be changed within degenerate eigenspaces and by compensating phases. Zero coefficients may be appended to make terms, since .
For a proof, form the reduced density matrix . It is a Hermitian matrix that is positive semidefinite, with trace one. The spectral theorem supplies an orthonormal basis of eigenvectors with nonnegative eigenvalues . Define the unnormalized relative vectors in the second Hilbert space by
Completeness of the first orthonormal basis gives . In any orthonormal basis of the second factor, the definition of the partial trace gives
Thus a zero eigenvalue gives , and for each positive eigenvalue the vector has unit norm. Distinct such vectors are orthogonal by the same identity. Substituting them gives the required Schmidt decomposition, with at most nonzero terms.
Taking the other partial trace now gives
Therefore the two reduced density matrices have identical nonzero eigenvalues, namely the squared Schmidt coefficients. This also proves uniqueness of the coefficient multiset and shows that the pure state is a product state exactly when .
The -qubit Pauli group is
A stabilizer group is an abelian subgroup of excluding . Its associated stabilizer code is the common positive eigenspace
The exclusion of is necessary for a nonzero code, since no nonzero vector has eigenvalue under .
Every is a signed Hermitian tensor product of Pauli matrices. An imaginary-phase Pauli element would have , contradicting closure of and exclusion of ; hence and . If , it cannot be a nontrivial scalar Pauli element, and at least one of its local factors is or . Each of these has trace zero. Using gives .
The spectral theorem for Hermitian operators and show that all eigenvalues are or . If their multiplicities are and , then
Thus the balanced spectrum of a nonidentity stabilizer is
This concerns a nonidentity stabilizer acting on the entire physical space; on the code every stabilizer acts with eigenvalue .
Because all elements commute and square to , is a vector space over under multiplication. Its independent stabilizer generators satisfy that no nonempty product is ; all products are distinct. The stabilizer-projector formula is
To verify it, group multiplication gives , Hermiticity gives , and for every . Conversely every code vector is fixed by this average, so its range is exactly . All nonidentity stabilizers have trace zero by the preceding proof. Therefore
For a code of dimension , the number of independent generators is consequently . One can list additional redundant generators, but an independent generating set has exactly this size.
For a correctable Pauli error , define the syndrome bit to be zero when commutes with and one when it anticommutes. On an encoded state,
Measure the commuting stabilizer generators; their eigenvalues reveal the error syndrome without revealing logical amplitudes. In a nondegenerate quantum code, the distinct specified correctable errors have orthogonal images of the code and distinct syndromes. A syndrome therefore identifies the error representative, and applying the inverse Pauli operator restores the encoded state.
If an actual error operator is a coherent linear combination of the specified errors, its state is a sum of these orthogonal syndrome components. Syndrome measurement selects one component, followed by the same inverse operation. The linearity of coherent quantum error correction ensures the logical state is recovered in every outcome. The same procedure handles noise Kraus operators in that error span; it does not require a probabilistic Pauli-noise assumption.
A Pauli error commuting with every stabilizer has the all-zero syndrome and preserves the code space. If it is a stabilizer up to global phase, this silent action is harmless. If it lies in the centralizer of a stabilizer group but is not a stabilizer up to phase, it acts as a nontrivial logical operator, and syndrome measurements cannot detect it. More generally, a non-scalar component of an error is an undetectable logical action. This distinguishes harmful undetected errors from scalar actions that satisfy quantum error detection algebraically.
The three-qubit bit-flip repetition code has basis and generators
A single phase flip commutes with both and has zero syndrome, but
It is a nontrivial logical phase operation. In particular, is not scalar, so the error set violates the Knill--Laflamme condition and cannot be corrected. Thus the code corrects single bit flips but not single phase flips; its distance against arbitrary quantum errors is one.