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Section 35.1 Diagonal form

When.

Each eigenvalue of A has its algebraic multiplicity equal to its geometric multiplicity. Additionally, if A is a real matrix and we would like both P and D to be real matrices, then we also need A to not have any complex eigenvalues.

How.

Compute a basis for each eigenspace. Put these bases together into the columns of P.

Result.

If the jth column of P is an eigenvector for eigenvalue λ, then the jth diagonal entry of D will be λ.