Schur decomposition

In the mathematical discipline of linear algebra, the Schur decomposition or Schur triangulation, named after Issai Schur, is a matrix decomposition. It allows to write an arbitrary matrix as unitarily equivalent to an upper triangular matrix whose diagonal elements are the eigenvalues of the original matrix. In the mathematical discipline of linear algebra, the Schur decomposition or Schur triangulation, named after Issai Schur, is a matrix decomposition. It allows to write an arbitrary matrix as unitarily equivalent to an upper triangular matrix whose diagonal elements are the eigenvalues of the original matrix. The Schur decomposition reads as follows: if A is a n × n square matrix with complex entries, then A can be expressed as where Q is a unitary matrix (so that its inverse Q−1 is also the conjugate transpose Q* of Q), and U is an upper triangular matrix, which is called a Schur form of A. Since U is similar to A, it has the same spectrum, and since it is triangular, its eigenvalues are the diagonal entries of U. The Schur decomposition implies that there exists a nested sequence of A-invariant subspaces {0} = V0 ⊂ V1 ⊂ ... ⊂ Vn = Cn, and that there exists an ordered orthonormal basis (for the standard Hermitian form of Cn) such that the first i basis vectors span Vi for each i occurring in the nested sequence. Phrased somewhat differently, the first part says that a linear operator J on a complex finite-dimensional vector space stabilizes a complete flag (V1,...,Vn). A constructive proof for the Schur decomposition is as follows: every operator A on a complex finite-dimensional vector space has an eigenvalue λ, corresponding to some eigenspace Vλ. Let Vλ⊥ be its orthogonal complement. It is clear that, with respect to this orthogonal decomposition, A has matrix representation (one can pick here any orthonormal bases Z1 and Z2 spanning Vλ and Vλ⊥ respectively) where Iλ is the identity operator on Vλ. The above matrix would be upper-triangular except for the A22 block. But exactly the same procedure can be applied to the sub-matrix A22, viewed as an operator on Vλ⊥, and its submatrices. Continue this way n times. Thus the space Cn will be exhausted and the procedure has yielded the desired result. The above argument can be slightly restated as follows: let λ be an eigenvalue of A, corresponding to some eigenspace Vλ. A induces an operator T on the quotient space Cn modulo Vλ. This operator is precisely the A22 submatrix from above. As before, T would have an eigenspace, say Wμ ⊂ Cn modulo Vλ. Notice the preimage of Wμ under the quotient map is an invariant subspace of A that contains Vλ. Continue this way until the resulting quotient space has dimension 0. Then the successive preimages of the eigenspaces found at each step form a flag that A stabilizes. Although every square matrix has a Schur decomposition, in general this decomposition is not unique. For example, the eigenspace Vλ can have dimension > 1, in which case any orthonormal basis for Vλ would lead to the desired result. Write the triangular matrix U as U = D + N, where D is diagonal and N is strictly upper triangular (and thus a nilpotent matrix). The diagonal matrix D contains the eigenvalues of A in arbitrary order (hence its Frobenius norm, squared, is the sum of the squared moduli of the eigenvalues of A, while the Frobenius norm of A, squared, is the sum of the squared singular values of A). The nilpotent part N is generally not unique either, but its Frobenius norm is uniquely determined by A (just because the Frobenius norm of A is equal to the Frobenius norm of U = D + N).