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Memoir on the Theory of Matrices: A PDF Edition of Cayley's Historic Paper on Matrix Operations



We establish a new connection between moments of \(n \times n\) random matrices Xn and hypergeometric orthogonal polynomials. Specifically, we consider moments \(\mathbbE\rm Tr X_n^-s\) as a function of the complex variable \(s \in \mathbbC\) , whose analytic structure we describe completely. We discover several remarkable features, including a reflection symmetry (or functional equation), zeros on a critical line in the complex plane, and orthogonality relations. An application of the theory resolves part of an integrality conjecture of Cunden et al. (J Math Phys 57:111901, 2016) on the time-delay matrix of chaotic cavities. In each of the classical ensembles of random matrix theory (Gaussian, Laguerre, Jacobi) we characterise the moments in terms of the Askey scheme of hypergeometric orthogonal polynomials. We also calculate the leading order \(n \rightarrow \infty\) asymptotics of the moments and discuss their symmetries and zeroes. We discuss aspects of these phenomena beyond the random matrix setting, including the Mellin transform of products and Wronskians of pairs of classical orthogonal polynomials. When the random matrix model has orthogonal or symplectic symmetry, we obtain a new duality formula relating their moments to hypergeometric orthogonal polynomials.


Heisenberg's paper establishing quantum mechanics[40][a] has puzzled physicists and historians. His methods assume that the reader is familiar with Kramers-Heisenberg transition probability calculations. The main new idea, non-commuting matrices, is justified only by a rejection of unobservable quantities. It introduces the non-commutative multiplication of matrices by physical reasoning, based on the correspondence principle, despite the fact that Heisenberg was not then familiar with the mathematical theory of matrices. The path leading to these results has been reconstructed in MacKinnon, 1977,[41] and the detailed calculations are worked out in Aitchison et al.[42]




memoir on the theory of matrices pdf download



Up until this time, matrices were seldom used by physicists; they were considered to belong to the realm of pure mathematics. Gustav Mie had used them in a paper on electrodynamics in 1912 and Born had used them in his work on the lattice theory of crystals in 1921. While matrices were used in these cases, the algebra of matrices with their multiplication did not enter the picture as they did in the matrix formulation of quantum mechanics.[47] 2ff7e9595c


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