Chapter 1: Systems of Linear Equations and Matrices

Lecture 2

Homogeneous Linear Systems

For a homogeneous system of linear equations either

(1) the system has only one solution, the trivial one;

(2) the system has more than one solution.

For a non-homogeneous system either

(1) the system has a single (unique) solution;

(2) the system has more than one solution;

(3) the system has no solution at all.

Properties of the homogenous system for Amn

If we were to carry out the above procedure on a general homogeneous system

Amn x = 0, we’d establish the following facts:

• The number of leading variables is ≤ min(m, n) .

• The number of non-zero equations in the echelon form of the system is equal
to the number of leading entries.

• The number of free variables plus the number of leading variables = n, the
number of columns of A.

• The homogenous system Ax = 0 has non-trivial solutions if and only if there

are free variables.

• If there are more unknowns than equations, the homogeneous system always
has nontrivial solutions. This is one of the few cases in which we can tell
something about the solutions without doing any work.

• A homogeneous system of equations is always consistent (i.e., always has at

least one solution).

1
Example 1

 1 2 0 1 0
Given the augmented matrix  2 3 4 5 0 . Solve the following system.
 2 4 0 2 0

Solution:

1 2 0 1 0
Step 1: Convert to row-echelon form and you will obtain 0 1 4 3 0
0 0 0 0 0

Step 2: Here, the leading variables are x1 and x2 , while x3 and x4 are the free
variables, since there are no leading entries in the third or fourth
columns. Continuing along, we obtain the Gauss-Jordan form (You
should be working out the details on your scratch paper as we go
along . . . .)

1 0 8 7 0
 
0 1 4 3 0
0 0 0 0 0

The system of equations now reads

x1  8x3  7 x4  0
x2  4x3  3 x4  0

Step 3: First, we solve for the leading variables; everything else goes on the
right hand side:

x1  8x3  7 x4
x2  4x3  3x4

Assigning any values we choose to the two free variables x3 and x4

gives us one the many solutions to the original homogeneous system.
This is, of course, why the variables are called ”free”. For example,
taking x3  1 and x4  0 gives the solution x1  8 and x2  4 . We
can distinguish the free variables from the leading variables by
denoting them as s, t, u, etc. This is not logically necessary; it just
makes things more transparent. Thus, setting x3  s and x4  t , we
rewrite the solution in the form

x1  8s  7t x3  s
x2  4s  3t x4  t

2
 Thus, the solution is consistent, infinite and trivial solution if s = 0 and
t = 0. The solutions are non-trivial if s and t are any real numbers
except for 0.

Example 2 (Non-homogeneous system)

For which values of a will the following system have

x  2y  1
2
2x  (a  5)y  a 1

a) no solutions

b) exactly one solution

c) infinitely many solutions

3
A Method for Inverting Matrices

To find the inverse of an invertible matrix A, we must find a sequence of

elementary row operation that reduces A to the identity and then perform this same
sequence of elementary row operation on In to obtain A1 .

A simple method for carrying out this procedure is given in the following example.

Example 3

1 2 3
 
Find the inverse of A  2 5 3 .
1 0 8

Solution:

We want to reduce A to the identity matrix by row operation and simultaneously

apply these operations to I to produce A1 . To accomplish this, we shall adjoin the
identity matrix to the right side of A, thereby producing a matrix of the form

 A I 

Then we shall apply row operations to this matrix until the left side is reduced to I.
These operations will convert the right side to A1 , so the final matrix will have the
form

 I A1 

The computations are as follows:

1 2 3 1 0 0
 
2 5 3 0 1 0
1 0 8 0 0 1


1 2 3 0 0
1
 
0 1 3 2 1 0
0 2 5 1 0 1


1 2 3 1 0 0
 
0 1 3 2 1 0
0 0 1 5 2 1 


4
 1 2 3 1 00
 
0 1 3 2 1 0 
0 0 1 5 2 1


1 2 0 14 6 3
 
0 1 0 13 5 3
0 0 1 5 2 1


1 0 0 40 16 9
 
0 1 0 13 5 3
0 0 1 5 2 1


 40 16 9 
Thus, A  
1
  13 5 3 .
 5 2 1

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Often, it will not be known in advance whether a given matrix is invertible. If an

n  n matrix A is not invertible, then it cannot be reduced to In by elementary row
operation. Stated another way, the reduced row-echelon form of A has at least one
row of zeros. Thus, if the procedure in the next example is attempted on a matrix
that is not invertible, then at some point in the computations a row of zeros will
occur on the left side. It can be concluded that the given matrix is not invertible,
and the computations can be stopped.

Example 4

Consider the matrix

1 6 4
 
A   2 4 1
 1 2 5 

Solution:

Applying the procedure, we will obtain

1 6 4 1 0 0
 
 2 4 1 0 1 0
 1 2 5 0 0 1 


5
 1 6 4 1 0 0
 
0 8 9 2 1 0
0 8 9 1 0 1 


1 6 4 1 0 0
 
0 8 9 2 1 0
0 0 0 1 1 1 


Since we obtained a row of zeros on the left side, A is not invertible.

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Solving Linear Systems by Matrix Inversion

We have studied two methods for solving linear systems: Gaussian elimination and
Gauss-Jordan elimination. The following theorem provides a new method for solving
certain linear systems.

Theorem 1

If A is invertible n  n matrix, then for each n  1 matrix b, the system of equations

Ax = b has exactly one solution, namely, x = A1 b.

Example 5

Consider the system of linear equations

x1  2x2  3x3  5
2x1  5x2  3x3  3
x1  8x3  17

Solve the given system.

Solution:

The system can be written in the following matrix form Ax = b, where

1 2 3  x1  5
 
A  2 5 3 , x =  x2  , b =  3  ,
1 0 8  x3  17 

6
In Example 3, of the preceding section, we showed that A is invertible and
 40 16 9 
 
1
A   13 5 3 .
 5 2 1

By Theorem 1, the solution of the system is

 40 16 9   5   1 
x = A b   13 5 3  3    1
1

 5 2 1 17  2 

or x1  1, x2  1, x3  2.

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Example 4

Consider the system of linear equations

x1  2x2  3x3  0
2x1  5x2  3x3  0
x1  8x3  0

The homogeneous system has only the trivial solution.

How I know? Wait for the further explanation.

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