Linear Algebra and Its Applications (5th Edition)

Published by Pearson
ISBN 10: 032198238X
ISBN 13: 978-0-32198-238-4

Chapter 2 - Matrix Algebra - 2.1 Exercises - Page 103: 19

Answer

The third column of $AB$ is the sum of the first two columns of $B$.

Work Step by Step

If $AB$ is defined for some matrix $A$, then by the definition of matrix multiplication, $AB=\begin{bmatrix}A\vec{b}_{1}&A\vec{b}_{2}&\cdots &A\vec{b}_{n}\end{bmatrix}$, where $B$ is assumed to have $n$ columns. Since $\vec{b}_{3}=\vec{b}_{1}+\vec{b}_{2}$, the distributivity of matrix multiplication over vector addition (Theorem 2(b); note that column vectors are simply $n\times 1$ matrices) allows us to conclude the following: $\begin{align}AB&=\begin{bmatrix}A\vec{b}_{1}&A\vec{b}_{2}&A\vec{b}_{3}&\cdots &A\vec{b}_{n}\end{bmatrix}\\ &=\begin{bmatrix}A\vec{b}_{1}&A\vec{b}_{2}&A(\vec{b}_{1}+\vec{b}_{2})&\cdots &A\vec{b}_{n}\end{bmatrix}\\ &=\begin{bmatrix}A\vec{b}_{1}&A\vec{b}_{2}&A\vec{b}_{1}+A\vec{b}_{2}&\cdots &A\vec{b}_{n}\end{bmatrix}. \end{align}$ This confirms that the third column of $AB$ is the sum of columns one and two.
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