Linear map


In mathematics, a linear map is a mapping between two modules that preserves the operations of addition and scalar multiplication. If a linear map is a bijection then it is called a linear isomorphism.
An important special case is when, in which case a linear map is called a endomorphism of. Sometimes the term linear operator refers to this case. In another convention, linear operator allows and to differ, while requiring them to be real vector spaces. Sometimes the term linear function has the same meaning as linear map, while in analytic geometry it does not.
A linear map always maps linear subspaces onto linear subspaces ; for instance it maps a plane through the origin to a plane, straight line or point. Linear maps can often be represented as matrices, and simple examples include rotation and reflection linear transformations.
In the language of abstract algebra, a linear map is a module homomorphism. In the language of category theory, it is a morphism in the category of modules over a given ring.

Definition and first consequences

Let and be vector spaces over the same field.
A function is said to be a linear map if for any two vectors and any scalar the following two conditions are satisfied:
Thus, a linear map is said to be operation preserving.
In other words, it does not matter whether the linear map is applied before or after the operations of addition and scalar multiplication.
By the associativity of the addition operation denoted as +, for any vectors and scalars the following equality holds:
Denoting the zero elements of the vector spaces and by and respectively, it follows that
Let and in the equation for homogeneity of degree 1:
Occasionally, and can be vector spaces over different fields.
It is then necessary to specify which of these ground fields is being used in the definition of "linear".
If and are spaces over the same field as above, then we talk about -linear maps.
For example, the conjugation of complex numbers is an -linear map, but it is not -linear, where and are symbols representing the sets of real numbers and complex numbers, respectively.
A linear map with viewed as a one-dimensional vector space over itself is called a linear functional.
These statements generalize to any left-module over a ring without modification, and to any right-module upon reversing of the scalar multiplication.

Examples

If V and W are finite-dimensional vector spaces and a basis is defined for each vector space, then every linear map from V to W can be represented by a matrix. This is useful because it allows concrete calculations. Matrices yield examples of linear maps: if A is a real matrix, then describes a linear map .
Let be a basis for V. Then every vector v in V is uniquely determined by the coefficients c1, …, cn in the field R:
If is a linear map,
which implies that the function f is entirely determined by the vectors f, …, f. Now let be a basis for W. Then we can represent each vector f as
Thus, the function f is entirely determined by the values of aij. If we put these values into an matrix M, then we can conveniently use it to compute the vector output of f for any vector in V. To get M, every column j of M is a vector
corresponding to f as defined above. To define it more clearly, for some column j that corresponds to the mapping f,
where M is the matrix of f. In other words, every column has a corresponding vector f whose coordinates a1j, …, amj are the elements of column j. A single linear map may be represented by many matrices. This is because the values of the elements of a matrix depend on the bases chosen.
The matrices of a linear transformation can be represented visually:
  1. Matrix for relative to :
  2. Matrix for relative to :
  3. Transition matrix from to :
  4. Transition matrix from to :
Such that starting in the bottom left corner and looking for the bottom right corner, one would left-multiply—that is,. The equivalent method would be the "longer" method going clockwise from the same point such that is left-multiplied with, or.

Examples of linear transformation matrices

In two-dimensional space R2 linear maps are described by 2 × 2 real matrices. These are some examples:
The composition of linear maps is linear: if and are linear, then so is their composition.
It follows from this that the class of all vector spaces over a given field K, together with K-linear maps as morphisms, forms a category.
The inverse of a linear map, when defined, is again a linear map.
If and are linear, then so is their pointwise sum is an associative algebra under composition of maps, since the composition of two linear maps is again a linear map, and the composition of maps is always associative.
This case is discussed in more detail below.
Given again the finite-dimensional case, if bases have been chosen, then the composition of linear maps corresponds to the matrix multiplication, the addition of linear maps corresponds to the matrix addition, and the multiplication of linear maps with scalars corresponds to the multiplication of matrices with scalars.

Endomorphisms and automorphisms

A linear transformation f: V → V is an endomorphism of V; the set of all such endomorphisms End together with addition, composition and scalar multiplication as defined above forms an associative algebra with identity element over the field K. The multiplicative identity element of this algebra is the identity map id: V → V.
An endomorphism of V that is also an isomorphism is called an automorphism of V. The composition of two automorphisms is again an automorphism, and the set of all automorphisms of V forms a group, the automorphism group of V which is denoted by Aut or GL. Since the automorphisms are precisely those endomorphisms which possess inverses under composition, Aut is the group of units in the ring End.
If V has finite dimension n, then End is isomorphic to the associative algebra of all n × n matrices with entries in K. The automorphism group of V is isomorphic to the general linear group GL of all n × n invertible matrices with entries in K.

Kernel, image and the rank–nullity theorem

If f : V → W is linear, we define the kernel and the image or range of f by
ker is a subspace of V and im is a subspace of W. The following dimension formula is known as the rank–nullity theorem:
The number dim is also called the rank of f and written as rank, or sometimes, ρ; the number dim is called the nullity of f and written as null or ν. If V and W are finite-dimensional, bases have been chosen and f is represented by the matrix A, then the rank and nullity of f are equal to the rank and nullity of the matrix A, respectively.

Cokernel

A subtler invariant of a linear transformation is the cokernel, which is defined as
This is the dual notion to the kernel: just as the kernel is a subspace of the domain, the co-kernel is a quotient space of the target.
Formally, one has the exact sequence
These can be interpreted thus: given a linear equation f = w to solve,
The dimension of the co-kernel and the dimension of the image add up to the dimension of the target space. For finite dimensions, this means that the dimension of the quotient space W/f is the dimension of the target space minus the dimension of the image.
As a simple example, consider the map f: R2 → R2, given by f =. Then for an equation f = to have a solution, we must have a = 0, and in that case the solution space is or equivalently stated, +,. The kernel may be expressed as the subspace < V: the value of x is the freedom in a solution – while the cokernel may be expressed via the map W → R, given a vector, the value of a is the obstruction to there being a solution.
An example illustrating the infinite-dimensional case is afforded by the map f: R∞ → R∞, with b1 = 0 and bn + 1 = an for n > 0. Its image consists of all sequences with first element 0, and thus its cokernel consists of the classes of sequences with identical first element. Thus, whereas its kernel has dimension 0, its co-kernel has dimension 1. Since the domain and the target space are the same, the rank and the dimension of the kernel add up to the same sum as the rank and the dimension of the co-kernel, but in the infinite-dimensional case it cannot be inferred that the kernel and the co-kernel of an endomorphism have the same dimension. The reverse situation obtains for the map h: R∞ → R∞, with cn = an + 1. Its image is the entire target space, and hence its co-kernel has dimension 0, but since it maps all sequences in which only the first element is non-zero to the zero sequence, its kernel has dimension 1.

Index

For a linear operator with finite-dimensional kernel and co-kernel, one may define index as:
namely the degrees of freedom minus the number of constraints.
For a transformation between finite-dimensional vector spaces, this is just the difference dim − dim, by rank–nullity. This gives an indication of how many solutions or how many constraints one has: if mapping from a larger space to a smaller one, the map may be onto, and thus will have degrees of freedom even without constraints. Conversely, if mapping from a smaller space to a larger one, the map cannot be onto, and thus one will have constraints even without degrees of freedom.
The index of an operator is precisely the Euler characteristic of the 2-term complex 0 → V → W → 0. In operator theory, the index of Fredholm operators is an object of study, with a major result being the Atiyah–Singer index theorem.

Algebraic classifications of linear transformations

No classification of linear maps could hope to be exhaustive. The following incomplete list enumerates some important classifications that do not require any additional structure on the vector space.
Let and denote vector spaces over a field and let be a linear map.
Definition: is said to be injective or a monomorphism if any of the following equivalent conditions are true:
  1. is one-to-one as a map of sets.
  4. is monic or left-cancellable, which is to say, for any vector space and any pair of linear maps and, the equation implies.
  5. is left-invertible, which is to say there exists a linear map such that is the identity map on.
Definition: is said to be surjective or an epimorphism if any of the following equivalent conditions are true:
  1. is onto as a map of sets.
  2. coker T =
  3. is epic or right-cancellable, which is to say, for any vector space and any pair of linear maps and, the equation implies.
  4. is right-invertible, which is to say there exists a linear map such that is the identity map on.
Definition: is said to be an isomorphism if it is both left- and right-invertible. This is equivalent to being both one-to-one and onto or also to being both epic and monic, and so being a bimorphism.
If is an endomorphism, then:
Given a linear map which is an endomorphism whose matrix is A, in the basis B of the space it transforms vector coordinates as = A. As vectors change with the inverse of B its inverse transformation is = B.
Substituting this in the first expression
hence
Therefore, the matrix in the new basis is A′ = B−1AB, being B the matrix of the given basis.
Therefore, linear maps are said to be 1-co- 1-contra-variant objects, or type tensors.

Continuity

A linear transformation between topological vector spaces, for example normed spaces, may be continuous.
If its domain and codomain are the same, it will then be a continuous linear operator.
A linear operator on a normed linear space is continuous if and only if it is bounded, for example, when the domain is finite-dimensional.
An infinite-dimensional domain may have discontinuous linear operators.
An example of an unbounded, hence discontinuous, linear transformation is differentiation on the space of smooth functions equipped with the supremum norm.
For a specific example, converges to 0, but its derivative does not, so differentiation is not continuous at 0.

Applications

A specific application of linear maps is for geometric transformations, such as those performed in computer graphics, where the translation, rotation and scaling of 2D or 3D objects is performed by the use of a transformation matrix. Linear mappings also are used as a mechanism for describing change: for example in calculus correspond to derivatives; or in relativity, used as a device to keep track of the local transformations of reference frames.
Another application of these transformations is in compiler optimizations of nested-loop code, and in parallelizing compiler techniques.