LA I: Epiphany Term Lecture Summaries

The table below lists the main topics to be covered in each lecture, and will be updated as the term proceeds.
(You may need to press shift-reload to get the latest version.)

MATH1091 Monday 11am CG93 Tuesday 11am CG93 Thursday 10am W103
MATH1071 Monday 12pm PH8 Thursday 12pm PH8 Friday 10am PH8
  11  (26)   Collections exam 1 Eigenvalues, eigenvectors and diagonalisation
  Changing the basis for the matrix of a linear transformation
  Eigenvectors and eigenvalues
  The characteristic equation
  Algebraic and geometric multiplicities of
    eigenvalues
  Eigenspaces
  12  (27)   The Cayley-Hamilton theorem
  Equivalence relations and similarity of matrices
  Diagonalisable matrices
  A key result: an NxN matrix is diagonalisable ⇔ it has N
    linearly independent eigenvectors
  Examples; application to systems of ODEs
  13  (28)   Linear independence of eigenvectors
    corresponding to distinct eigenvalues
2 Inner product spaces
  Bilinear forms on real vector spaces
  Inner products on real vector spaces
  Problems class
  14  (29)   The matrix of an inner product
  Symmetric and antisymmetric matrices
  Positive-definite matrices and Sylvester's criterion
  Complex (Hermitian) inner products
  Hermitian and anti-Hermitian matrices
  Norms on real vector spaces
  The triangle and Cauchy-Schwarz inequalities 
  15  (30)   The complex case and the complex C-S inequality
  Orthogonal and orthonormal vectors
  The Gram-Schmidt procedure
  The Gram-Schmidt procedure (ctd)   Problems class
  16  (31)   The orthogonal complement of a subspace
  Orthogonal projection
  Properties of projection operators
  Projection as a way to find the element of a
    subspace closest to a given vector
  Bessel's inequality
  Orthogonal and unitary diagonalisation
  The orthogonal and special orthogonal groups
  The unitary and special unitary groups
  Symmetric and Hermitian matrices have:
  - real eigenvalues
  - orthog. eigenvectors for distinct eigenvalues
  Furthermore they can always be orthogonally
    or unitarily diagonalised
  17  (32)   Example: diagonalisation of a symmetric matrix
3 Orthogonal polynomials
  Linear ODEs with polynomial solutions
  More-general (weighted) inner products on spaces of functions
  Legendre polynomials as an orthonormal system
  Further examples: Chebyshev I & II, Hermite and Laguerre
  Problems class
  18  (33)   Symmetric linear operators
  Example: the Laguerre differential operator
  Linear ODEs as eigenvalue problems
  Orthogonal polynomials w.r.t. an inner product (,), graded
    by degree, are eigenfunctions of certain linear differential
    operators which are symmetric w.r.t. the same inner product
  Polynomial solutions of the Legendre equation
  Proof that orthogonal polynomials are
    eigenfunctions of certain symmetric linear
    differential operators
  Hermitian and anti-Hermitian operators on
    complex inner product spaces
  19  (34) 4 Group theory
  The group axioms: closure, associativity,
    identity and inverses
  Subgroups and Lagrange's theorem
  Examples of groups
  Finite groups
  The cyclic group ℤn and its group (Cayley) table
  Problems class








Patrick Dorey  
Last modified: 6 March 2025  
Images: mathematicians from MacTutor;  
Kermit from 𝕏;  
quilts from the University of Kentucky Math Lab.