Consider a vector quantity of which the change in time is given by the equation with matrix
-
Calculate the eigenvalues and vectors of .
-
What is the formula for the solution at any time ?
-
What are successively , and when ?
-
What are the answers to task (c) ? Give the equation of the path in the - plane.
- What are the answers to task (c) ? Give the equation of the path in the - plane.
- Give the equation of the trajectory of a solution for an arbitrary choice ?
with
- The characteristic polynomial of is because of its lower triangle form
equal to
The eigenvalues of are zeros of the characteristic polynomial: .
Let be an eigenvector corresponding to the eigenvalue :
.
Then:
So: and an eigenvector corresponding to the eigenvalue (with integral coefficients)
is .
- A generalised eigenvector corresponding to the eigenvalue satisfies
with and
So: .
Thus: and can be freely chosen.
Take , then is a generalised eigenvector.
The general solution is with constants and .
- means that and .
Substitution in the general solution (b) gives and ,
and thus
.
Then: .
- means that and .
Substitution in the general solution (b) gives and ,
and thus .
Then: .
When then and So:
- means that and .
Substitution in the general solution (b) gives and . and thus .
Then: .
The orbit is .
- means and .
Substitution in the general solution (b) gives .
When , then generically and .
The orbit has generically the equation
'Generically' means that we assume logarithms with a positive argument.
So we consider the case and and the case and .
The case that is dealt with in (e):
The trajectory is the positive vertical axis.
This is illustrated in the phase portrait below.
The equilibrium is attracting.