Existence of n T-invariant Subspaces in Vector Spaces and Linear Operators

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Hi everyone- any help would be great!

For each integer n>= 2, there exists a vector space V and a linear
operator T : L(V ) such that V has exactly n T- invariant subspaces.

I think it is true but i do not know how to prove it...
awesome thanks!
 
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try it for n=2. what have you got?
 


Hello, thank you for your question. The statement is indeed true and can be proven using induction on the dimension of the vector space. Let's first define what a T-invariant subspace is.

A subspace W of a vector space V is called T-invariant if T(W) is a subset of W. In other words, the linear operator T maps vectors in W to other vectors in W.

Now, let's consider the base case n=2. For a vector space V with dimension 2, we can have two T-invariant subspaces: the zero subspace {0} and the entire vector space V.

Now, assume that for some integer k>=2, the statement is true for all vector spaces with dimension k. That is, for any linear operator T on a vector space V with dimension k, there exists exactly k T-invariant subspaces.

We will now prove that the statement is also true for dimension k+1. Consider a vector space V with dimension k+1 and a linear operator T on V. By the induction hypothesis, we know that there exist k T-invariant subspaces W1, W2, ..., Wk of V.

Now, consider the subspace W = W1 + W2 + ... + Wk. This subspace is also T-invariant since for any vector w in W, we can write it as a linear combination of vectors in W1, W2, ..., Wk and T(w) will also be a linear combination of vectors in W1, W2, ..., Wk, thus remaining in W.

Additionally, we know that V/W is also a vector space with dimension 1. Therefore, by the base case, there exists exactly one T-invariant subspace U of V/W.

Combining these two subspaces, we have a total of k+1 T-invariant subspaces of V, satisfying the statement for dimension k+1.

Thus, by induction, the statement is true for all n>=2. I hope this helps.
 
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