text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

The discovery of cosmic microwave background temperature fluctuations in 1964 has revolutionised cosmology. Prior to 1992, one could only speculate about the initial conditions for structure formation. Primordial acausal curvature fluctuations were first detected by an experiment on the COBE satellite that mapped the sky on angular scales in excess of 5 degrees, much larger than the causal horizon of approximately one degree at last scattering. This provided the first glimpse of what was to come over the next ten years. Provided one adopted the inflationary prescription of scale-invariant fluctuations, one could make the connection to the long sought seeds of large-scale structure formation. But the connection was tenuous, and purely theoretical.

There were two stages to the discovery. As early as 1967, the prediction was made  that intrinsic horizon-scale density fluctuations could be as large as 10 percent without exceeding the current limits on the cosmic microwave background isotropy at that time. These fluctuations were considered to be on scales in excess of the last scattering horizon and were imprinted acausally at the beginning of the universe. The connection with galaxy formation arising from primordial irregularities of infinitesimal amplitude, the current paradigm for structure formation, was also made in 1967 . The relic temperature fluctuations are causally generated from sound waves in the primordial baryon-photon plasma on the last scattering surface of the cosmic microwave background at redshift $`z1000.`$

The search for cosmic microwave background temperature fluctuations was long. Results from the COBE far infrared spectrophotometer (FIRAS) showed in 1990 that the spectrum of the cosmic microwave background did not deviate from a blackbody by more than $`0.01\%`$ of its peak brightness. Large-angular scale fluctuations in the CMB were eventually discovered in 1992 using the COBE differential microwave radiometer (DMR)  at a level $`\delta T/T10^5,`$ to within a factor of two of the expectation from the twin hypotheses of structure formation by gravitational instability and a scale-invariant spectrum of primordial adiabatic density fluctuations. However, the extrapolation from the COBE observations to scales of direct interest to structure formation, from $`\mathrm{}20`$ to $`\mathrm{}200`$, where the spherical harmonic wave-number $`\mathrm{}180^{}/\theta `$ for angular scale $`\theta ,`$ was large. It took nearly a decade after the COBE launch before direct detection of the elusive fluctuations that gave rise to large-scale structure was achieved.

Sub-degree scale temperature fluctuations from the surface of last scattering were finally confirmed, and in particular the first peak was measured, by a series of balloon and mountain-top experiments , , , ,, , , that spanned the range $`\mathrm{}20`$ to $`\mathrm{}2000.`$ The causal adiabatic fluctuations were amplified from primordial curvature fluctuations by subhorizon growth in the matter-dominated era. This enhancement was detected as a series of so-called acoustic peaks, the first and best-measured feature (known to better than ten standard deviations by the end of 2002) corresponding to the angular scale of the horizon at last scattering. The peaks are driven by sound waves in the primordial baryon-photon plasma, and the sound wave amplitude measures the seeds of present-day structure formation.

The theory of gravitational instability in the expanding universe as the driver of growth of structure from infinitesimal primordial density fluctuations, pioneered in a remarkable paper dating from 1946 , was dramatically confirmed. Gravitational instability accounts for the origin of large-scale structure and in particular for the formation of the galaxies. The primordial structure was inhomogeneous at a level of around one part in 100,000. On comoving scales in excess of 100 Mpc, the universe is still uniform today and approaches this level on the horizon scale. However subhorizon growth means that the comoving scales of galaxy clusters (approximately 10 Mpc) were first nonlinear at a redshift of order unity, massive galaxies at a redshift of around 3, and dwarf galaxies at a redshift of order 10. These inferences come from measurement of the power spectrum of temperature fluctuations, from which the density fluctuation spectrum can be recovered. The discovery of the fossil fluctuations that seeded structure formation is a stunning intellectual achievement of the 20th century.

Complementary information comes from deep galaxy redshift surveys and from the line-of-sight correlations of intergalactic clouds viewed via Lyman alpha absorption against high redshift quasars. It is remarkable that the fluctuation spectrum measured at a redshift of 1000 agrees in shape and normalization with independent measurements of large-scale structure , . These are performed at redshifts of 0.3 and 3, corresponding to the typical depths of the 2DF/SDSS galaxy samples and the Lyman alpha forest . Even the bias factor, which measures the ratio of the variance in galaxy counts to dark matter density fluctuations, can now be inferred via a combination of any two of several independent techniques: large-scale clustering , CMB data , weak lensing , , and the galaxy cluster abundance . A bias of approximately 4/3 is inferred on galaxy cluster scales. This means that the rms fluctuations in dark matter density are 75 percent of the variance in luminous galaxy counts sampled over randomly placed spheres of 10 Mpc diameter. Galaxy formation is only weakly biased.

## 2 Some history

The cosmic microwave background and the temperature fluctuations therein are two of the major predictions of the Big Bang theory. Others are the expansion of the universe and the light element abundances. The latter motivated the cosmic microwave background prediction. Friedmann and independently Lemaître are credited with the first predictions of the expansion of space. Indeed Lemaître predicted a linear relation between galaxy redshift and distance, verified by Hubble in 1929. Curiously, Hubble never accepted the Big Bang interpretation of his redshift law as the expansion of space. It has even been speculated that Hubble’s reluctance to accept that the eponymous law was a fundamental contribution to the confirmation of the theory of the expanding universe may explain why Nobel recognition eluded him.

Gamow pioneered the predictions of element nucleosynthesis in the first few minutes of the Big Bang , but the important recognition by Hayashi in 1950 that the neutron abundance was determined by thermal equilibrium in the primordial plasma set the scene for the later precise predictions of the light element abundances. Gamow’s associates Alpher and Herman  realized in 1949 that the inference the universe necessarily was hot at the epoch of primordial nucleosynthesis implied that, in order to get a reasonable helium abundance, the present epoch radiation background was characterised by a temperature of 5 K. However they failed in any published work over the following decade to make the connection with an observable microwave background. Indeed, later papers speculated about a radiation temperature today as high as 50K.

The connection with observations was first attempted in discussions in 1962 by Zeldovich  and in 1964 by Doroshkevich and Novikov , who even interpreted a Bell Labs measurement of the atmospheric temperature as setting a limit of only 1 K on the cosmic radiation background to be evidence for an initially cold universe. But in effect an extraterrestrial signal was lurking in the measured antenna temperature. Evidence of absence did not guarantee absence of evidence, and the cosmic microwave background was discovered within a year via the epochal detection by Penzias and Wilson of what they described as an excess antenna temperature, isotropic in the sky. Penzias and Wilson did not initially realize the significance of their discovery, and the connection with the Big Bang was made in a pioneering companion paper by Dicke and collaborators at Princeton, who had been searching, simultaneously and independently, for the cosmic microwave background. The Princeton group realized that the early universe would have been an ideal furnace for generating blackbody radiation. Dicke in particular, an experimentalist who was apparently unaware of Gamow’s work and was convinced that the Big Bang was cyclic, had long realized that light element synthesis in the Big Bang implied a present day blackbody radiation field at a few K, peaking at microwave frequencies.

Observations of the blackbody-like spectral dependence of the CMB accumulated over the next two and a half decades, but it was not until the launch of the COBE FIRAS interferometer that a definitive spectral measurement was forthcoming. FIRAS confirmed the CMB spectrum was that of a blackbody at $`2.725\pm 0.002\mathrm{K},`$ with a precision limited only by that of the on-board calibration source . The cosmic blackbody spectrum is comparable to that of the best laboratory blackbody spectral determination.

Parallel theoretical developments focussed on angular variations in the CMB temperature. In 1967, Sachs and Wolfe had predicted that primordial curvature fluctuations could exist on horizon scales, $`1000`$ Mpc, generating temperature fluctuations on large angular scales with an amplitude of order 1 percent. These would have been acausal and attributable to the initial conditions of the Big Bang. Subsequent studies of the first instants of the universe led to the development in 1981 of inflationary cosmology, which predicted adiabatic, gaussian fluctuations that were boosted from quantum fluctuations to macroscopic scales during an early de Sitter phase. The universe expanded exponentially during a brief moment, triggered by the spontaneous breaking of the GUT symmetry at a temperature of about $`10^{16}`$ GeV. The theory also predicted that the fluctuations should be approximately scale-invariant, although the amplitude was not specified, in agreement with earlier conjectures that have become known as the Harrison–Zeldovich spectrum (, , ). Many versions of inflation also subsequently predicted this, but perhaps the most noteworthy prediction of inflation is that the universe should be flat (, , ).

Another pre-inflationary prediction, and one that inflation did not, and could not, provide, was that of the strength of the primordial density fluctuations. This yielded the first quantitative estimate of the fluctuations that are required to have seeded structure by gravitational instability-induced growth. A simple prediction based on adiabatic fluctuations required $`\delta T/T`$ to be a few parts in ten thousand at last scattering on angular scales of a few arc minutes in order to have formed galaxies and clusters by the present epoch . The prediction simply utilized the adiabatic relation that, if recombination were instantaneous, would give $`\delta T/T\frac{1}{3}\delta \rho /\rho `$.

The current prediction is about a factor of 10 smaller than implied by this simple expression. What causes the diminution? The realization that decoupling of the two fluids was not instantaneous  results in a substantial decrease of the relic temperature fluctuations . Modern treatments, which incorporated cold dark matter, were first performed in 1984 (, ), and allow fluctuation growth after the epoch of matter-radiation equality but prior to last scattering, anticipating a peak value $`\delta T/T3\times 10^5`$ on an angular scale of about half a degree. This corresponds to the horizon scale at last scattering.

The predictions refer to causal fluctuations generated by gravitational instability on subhorizon scales during the era of matter domination, and apply on the largest scales where structure is seen, namely galaxy clusters and superclusters, and hence to angular scales of order tens of arc minutes. The coherent peaks in the radiation density are due to compressions and rarefactions of sound waves in the primordial plasma as viewed at last scattering. The occurrence of multiple peaks in the radiation power spectrum was first described in 1976 , and were only accurately described as a generic description developed from a multipole expansion of the CMB sky in 1981 . This approach incorporated the first application to temperature fluctuation predictions of the coupling of the primordial photon-baryon plasma by the Boltzmann equation, originally given in a classic paper in 1970 . The latter paper indeed reported the existence of coherent baryon oscillations of the adiabatic mode in the matter-radiation plasma at matter-radiation decoupling, also independently noted by . These two papers quantify the so-called Sakharov oscillations  in the matter power spectrum. These matter power spectrum oscillations have recently been detected, albeit with modest significance, in the 2DF galaxy survey .

Progressively more detailed discussions in the 1990s describe a series of acoustic peaks, interpreted in the context of inflationary amplification of quantum fluctuations. These result in temporally coherent fluctuations on the surface of last scattering at $`z1000`$ that are driven by the growing adiabatic mode of linear theory.

The connection between $`\delta T/T`$ and structure formation presented a definitive experimental target in the 1970s and 1980s, although the goalposts were moved in 1984 when cold dark matter was first included into the computational recipe. The prevalence of weakly interacting dark matter that dominates the baryon density by a factor $`10`$ means that substantial fluctuation growth occurs between the epoch of the onset of matter domination at $`z4\times 10^3,`$ prior to last scattering at $`z10^3.`$ This reduces the predicted fluctuation strength by a factor $`4,`$ and significantly modifies the detailed structure of the radiation power spectrum.

Upper limits were successively improved. Only with the COBE DMR detection in 1992 of large angular scale fluctuations attributed to the acausal conditions at the beginning of the universe was it realized that the elusive, causally amplified, subhorizon, fluctuations on the last scattering surface that seeded the observed large-scale structure might be within reach once foregrounds could properly be accounted for.

A series of experiments led to multifrequency measurements that could eliminate dust and synchrotron galactic foregrounds. These had plagued much of the earlier work, but bolometer sensitivities improved and microwave receiver noise temperatures were reduced while bandwidths were increased. The backgrounds could be modeled with sufficiently high sensitivity, wide spectral frequency and sky coverage. The definitive measurements came in at the beginning of the new millennium, from the BOOMERANG and MAXIMA bolometric balloon experiments and the DASI, VSA and CBI mountain-based interferometers.

The conclusions have revolutionized cosmology. The hypothesis of structure formation by gravitational instability of primordial infinitesimal inhomogeneities has been verified. The flatness of the universe is measured: the first peak occurs at $`\mathrm{}=215\pm 10`$ and requires $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0=1.02\pm 0.06.`$ The power spectrum of the fluctuations is described by a constant index power law fit by $`n=0.96\pm 0.06,`$ essentially the scale-invariant expectation. The baryon abundance is confirmed to be $`\mathrm{\Omega }_bh^2=0.021\pm 0.04.`$ All of these quantities are cited at 68% confidence (e.g. , ).

## 3 Some theory

Detection of the CMB fluctuations is a triumph of the simplest Big Bang cosmology: confirmation of a linearly perturbed expanding universe. To describe the anisotropies in a Euclidean geometry, one expands the temperature field on the celestial sphere in spherical harmonics

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }T}{T}(\widehat{n})=\underset{\mathrm{}=2}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\underset{m=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}a_\mathrm{}mY_\mathrm{}m(\widehat{n}).$$
(1)
By definition the mean value of the $`a_\mathrm{}m`$ is zero.

The correlation function (or $`2`$point function) of the temperature field $`C(\theta )`$ is the average of $`\mathrm{\Delta }T/T(\widehat{n}_1)\mathrm{\Delta }T/T(\widehat{n}_2)`$ across all pairs of points in the sky $`(\widehat{n}_1,\widehat{n}_2)`$ separated by an angle $`\theta `$$`\mathrm{cos}\theta =\widehat{n}_1\widehat{n}_2`$). One usually assumes statistical isotropy and Gaussian statistics. One can now write down  a multipole expansion

$$C(\theta )=\frac{1}{4\pi }\underset{\mathrm{}}{}(2\mathrm{}+1)C_{\mathrm{}}P_{\mathrm{}}(\mathrm{cos}\theta )$$
(2)
where $`P_{\mathrm{}}(\mathrm{cos}\theta )`$ are the Legendre polynomials and the $`C_{\mathrm{}}`$ are the multipole moments,

$$C_{\mathrm{}}=\underset{m=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}a_\mathrm{}m^{}a_\mathrm{}m,$$
(3)
and where $`\mathrm{}\theta ^1`$.

Each $`C_{\mathrm{}}`$ comes from averaging over $`2\mathrm{}+1`$ modes, and the sample variance error on $`C_{\mathrm{}}`$ is

$$\frac{\delta C_{\mathrm{}}}{C_{\mathrm{}}}=\sqrt{\frac{2}{2\mathrm{}+1}}f_{\mathrm{sky}}^{1/2}$$
(4)
where a fraction $`f_{\mathrm{sky}}`$ of the sky is observed , . The contribution to the logarithmic power is usually written as $`\mathrm{}(\mathrm{}+1)C_{\mathrm{}}`$, this combination being constant at low $`\mathrm{}`$ for scale-invariant fluctuations.

The radiation power spectrum shows two characteristic angular scales. A prominent peak occurs at $`\mathrm{}220`$ or about 30 arc-minutes. This is the angular scale that corresponds to the horizon at the moment of last scattering of the radiation. The corresponding comoving scale, corresponding to the wavelength of a wave that just spans this horizon, is approximately 100 Mpc. The second scale is the damping scale of about 6 arc-minutes, where the finite thickness of the last scattering surface just spans a wave of comoving scale around 10 Mpc and damps out temperature fluctuations on smaller scales .

The principal features that separate these scales are the Sachs-Wolfe plateau at low $`\mathrm{},`$ the series of peaks between $`\mathrm{}=2002000`$, and the damping tail. The peaks are the relic of coupled photon-baryon oscillations, in effect sound waves in the primordial plasma, at the epoch of last scattering of radiation and matter. One finds a series of peaks because the growing mode of fluctuations is the only surviving mode, and are phase-locked on super-horizon scales most likely due to their inflationary origin. Waves that just crest at last scattering produce the first adiabatic peak in the CMB. Waves of half the last horizon scale also crest, as do smaller waves until damping sets in at about 10 percent of the wavelength of the first acoustic peak. The peaks in the power spectrum are associated with successive maxima and minima of density waves in the coupled photon-baryon plasma, alternately in and out of phase with the dark matter potential wells that dominate the gravity and correspond to compressions and rarefactions on the last scattering surface that in turn generate hot spots and cold spots in the radiation on the last scattering surface. In quadrature, these are represented as a series of peaks in the power spectrum.

Coherent peaks are generated because an inflationary, or more generally, a very early, origin means that only the growing mode of fluctuations are present, and since no growth occurs on superhorizon scales, the phases of the waves can only evolve once growth commences after entering the horizon. Hence for example any wave that just spans the horizon at last scattering has the same phase. Any wave that spans half the horizon at last scattering has had exactly the same amount of subhorizon growth, so these too are in phase. Now the wave amplitude is proportional to $`cos(kt/a),`$ where $`k/a`$ is the wave-number, $`a(t)`$ is the cosmological scale factor, and the initial conditions are such that the amplitude must be constant (and independent of wave-number for a scale-invariant spectrum) on super-horizon scales $`2\pi a/kct.`$ This is the Sachs-Wolfe effect. The wave cresting at last scattering $`t_{LS}`$ gives the first peak, and there is a series of compression/rarefaction peaks at $`kt_{LS}/a=(n+1)\pi ,n=0,1,2\mathrm{}.,`$ and Doppler peaks at $`kt_{LS}/a=(n+1/2)\pi ,n=0,1,2\mathrm{}..`$ The compression mode is found to be dominant.

The Doppler effect  generates smaller peaks that are 90 degrees out of phase with the compression mode, and the effect of enhancing the baryon component is to strengthen the compressions relative to the rarefactions because of the baryonic contribution to the gravity . The baryon density controls the rarefaction amplitude relative to the compression amplitude, so the odd-even alternation of peak strengths enables $`\mathrm{\Omega }_bh^2`$ to be read off the sky.

The influence on the radiation power spectrum of spatial curvature with accurate matter-radiation coupling was first computed in 1981 . In curved space, a generalised multipole expansion is necessary. One finds that spatial curvature modifies the angular distribution but its effects are readily disentangled. In the modern language of acoustic peaks, the peaks are found to be shifted by a factor of order $`\mathrm{\Omega }^{1/2}`$ towards smaller angular scales in hyperbolic spaces, for progressively lower $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ , ). Confirmation of the flatness of the universe via measurement of the peak location represents a major triumph of inflationary cosmology.

There are many complications, some welcome, some less so. The overall amplitude of the peaks is largely controlled by $`\mathrm{\Omega }_m`$, or more precisely the ratio of matter to radiation densities and by $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }.`$ There is a degeneracy between $`\mathrm{\Omega }_m`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ that cannot be resolved by the CMB alone . Reionization suppresses the total power, and in particular all of the peak heights, and can be constrained . In fact, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ results in lensing of the peaks and redistributes power to small scales, so only very high $`\mathrm{}`$ measurements can help break this degeneracy  In practice, the degeneracy is best broken by correlation with deep redshift surveys since the effects of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ are most important at $`z\stackrel{<}{}1`$ .

## 4 Implications

One frontier has recently been breached in the CMB. The first detection of polarization has been reported by the DASI interferometer. The polarization in an FRW universe is due to the anisotropy of the Thompson scattering cross-section combined with the intrinsic quadrupole component of the radiation fluctuations . This results in polarisation that typically peaks at the angular scale of the last scattering surface. Detection provides additional confirmation of the standard model.

The cosmic microwave background fluctuations provide an important probe of inflation. This arises in two ways. Firstly fluctuations on angular scales larger than a degree are acausal at last scattering and so are generated at GUT scales during inflation or even earlier as part of Planck era physics. One is directly viewing the impact of quantum fluctuations. Secondly, gravity waves are generically generated as a tensor mode in inflationary models. These contribute only to the large angular scale anisotropies, since the tensor mode is incompressible and redshifts away on subhorizon scales once the universe is matter-dominated . One can constrain the tensor/scalar ratio from the ratio of the low $`\mathrm{}`$ amplitude to the peak heights, combined with the 2DF power spectrum, to be less than about 70 percent .

Polarisation of the temperature fluctuations will eventually provide a much more constraining probe of both the ionization history and primordial gravity waves . In general, the polarisation can be separated into two modes that can be expressed as the gradient and the curl of a potential. Electron scattering of a radiation field with an intrinsic quadrupole component generates the gradient mode of polarisation. Gravitational lensing couples this gradient to the curl mode. However only gravity waves give an intrinsic curl component of polarisation. This provides a unique signature that can in principle be disentangled from the induced curl polarisation, and should be detectable on degree scales or larger at the 0.5$`\mu `$K level for typical inflationary models .

Reionisation further complicates matters, since late electron scattering also polarises the CMB. For typical models, the detailed $`C_{\mathrm{}}`$ spectrum of scalar-induced polarisation should be distinguishable at a level of 5–10$`\mu `$K on small angular scales and around 1$`\mu `$K on large scales $`(\mathrm{}\stackrel{<}{}200)`$ . Late reionization produces the gradient mode of polarisation and has a characterisic low $`\mathrm{}`$ bump corresponding to the horizon size at reionization , . In fact the gradient terms contribute to polarisation at a level of about $`0.1\delta T/T,`$ and this has been detected by the DASI interferometer on 5-30 arc-minute scales . The MAP satellite should be capable of seeing the characteristic peak associated with reionization, if this occurred at $`z\stackrel{>}{}10.`$

The tensor contribution to the curl component of polarisation is only of order $`0.01\delta T/T,`$ and detection will require dedicated experiments that must await the post-Planck era, 2008 or later. Detection of the gravity wave mode would provide another powerful confirmation of inflation, which generically predicts a mixture of scalar and tensor relic fluctuation modes with approximately scale-invariant spectra.

In contrast, pre-Big Bang and ekpyrotic models usually predict blue spectra of primordial gravity waves that would not leave any detectable CMB relic polarisation. Intrinsic non-gaussianity is an aspect of generic very early universe models that could also help constrain inflation. There are hundreds of variants of inflationary cosmology, and it is difficult to come up with any definitive tests, other than perhaps the prediction of flatness of space. Multiple scalar fields that drive several phases of inflation, or interact during the primary phase, will lead to non-gaussian fluctuations. Topological defects such as cosmic strings or textures that are generated during post-inflationary reheating are a promising source of non-gaussian fluctuations on small angular scales, although these must be subdominant with regard to structure formation.

At high $`\mathrm{},`$ the observed damping provides an independent probe of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_b,`$ and confirmation of the physics of last scattering. Beyond $`\mathrm{}2000,`$ non-linear effects play an important role. The most prominent of these is the Sunyaev-Zeldovich (SZ) effect, which is the cumulative contribution of hot gas in distant unresolved clusters along the line of sight, and is uniquely distinguishable by its spectral characteristics as an apparent deficit below 218 GHz in the rest frame and excess at higher frequency, relative to the CMB. There is a reported 2$`\sigma `$ detection at $`\mathrm{}2500`$ by the CBI experiment which however only covers a narrow frequency range near 30 Ghz .

The Ostriker-Vishniac  and Rees-Sciama  effects are also of interest at $`\mathrm{}\stackrel{>}{}3000,`$ due respectively to correlations of linear compressions and rarefactions with Doppler contributions along the line of sight and to traversal by CMB photons across the time-dependent potential wells associated with forming galaxy clusters, respectively. These anisotropies are expected to amount to only a percent or so of the SZ effect, as also is the kinematic SZ effect. However the challenge of detecting secondary fluctuations is important, since they probe the epoch of reionisation. Another aspect that is characteristic of secondary fluctuations is that they are expected to be intrinsically non-Gaussian, as well as being anti-correlated with the primary fluctuations. In general, reionization damping of primary fluctuations generates secondary fluctuations and enhances the polarisation: a recent discussion is given in .

The acausality of large angular scale fluctuations $`(\stackrel{>}{}1^{})`$ means that they were generated either as initial conditions or by an early de Sitter phase of inflation. The latter occurred in the first $`10^{35}`$ second, and amplified quantum fluctuations onto macroscopic scales. An example of a novel approach to initial conditions comes from the ekpyrotic cosmology. This model dispenses with inflation and sets up the fluctuations in a pre-Big Bang phase that can be identified with the past history of two colliding branes. The brane intersection signals the initial moment of the Big Bang at the Planck time. This is also a singularity in space-time, and the calculations of the emergent density fluctuations are controversial.

The synthesis of baryons occurs at electroweak (100 GeV) or GUT ($`10^{16}`$ GeV) scales, and is responsible for the specific entropy of the universe, that is, the number of photons per baryon observed in the CMB. It is tied in with lepton synthesis and generation of lepton number $`L`$ , since $`BL`$ is generally conserved in subsequent phase transitions that may dilute any primordial baryon number $`B`$. The blackbody spectrum itself was generated in the first hours of the Big Bang. Double Compton scattering and bremsstrahlung are the key processes responsible for thermalisation. An essentially perfect blackbody is generated. No trace of thermalization processes is left, other than by possible late energy injection after the thermalization epoch.

The matter and radiation remain coupled until a redshift of about 1000. Hence the temperature fluctuations trace the degree of matter inhomogeneity over the first 300,000 years of the universe. One mostly measures the imprint of density fluctuations on the last scattering surface. These dominate the acoustic peaks. There is also a contribution at lower $`\mathrm{}`$ from the integrated Sachs-Wolfe effect, both before and after last scattering, due to the decay of the ratio of the radiation to the matter densities.

The temperature fluctuation mapping has led to an era of precision cosmology. One measures in addition to $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0`$ and $`n`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_b`$ as well as a combination of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and $`H_0.`$ With independent determinations of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_m`$ from large-scale structure, the standard model is well defined and well constrained.

## 5 Towards the Future

There are some 10 parameters that describe the CMB fluctuations, in addition to the 6 or so that characterise the standard moodel of cosmology. What is remarkable is that precise measurements of the CMB fluctuations can potentially measure almost all of these parameters with unrivalled precision. There are degeneracies, most notably between $`\mathrm{\Omega }_m`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda },`$ but these can largely be resolved by cross-correlating with other data such as wide area weak lensing surveys. These are exciting times for the cosmic microwave background, especially in combination with other data sets. The precision of the measurements is vastly superior to that of a decade ago. The overall picture is one of consistency with what is rapidly emerging as the standard model of cosmology.

There are less conventional issues that the CMB may eventually tackle. Gravity could change on very large scales, and the CMB uniquely probes the largest scales via the integrated Sachs-Wolfe effect, thereby providing a potentially unique probe of exotic gravity models . The topology of the universe is not predicted by general relativity, or for that matter by quantum gravity. The CMB may provide the only means of ever detecting a topological signature of space-time. A flat, compact topology can undergo inflation from a quantum origin . If the topological scale is on the order of the horizon scale, a detectable imprint in the form of a non-Gaussian pattern is generated on the CMB sky . The existing COBE data eliminate all toroidal topologies if the topological scale is of order the present horizon scale or less . The universe is locally isotropic but globally anisotropic in many of the topological representations, which, in the case of a flat universe, only amount to a handful of more general possibilities. It will be interesting to eventually explore some of the resulting patterns with more sensitivity and better resolution .

One can hope to probe the beginning of the universe; indeed, one already does this with large angular scale fluctuations. There is considerable support for inflation from the observed flatness of the universe, as well as from the approximate scale invariance of the power spectrum and the coherence of the acoustic peaks, although one hesitates to cite these latter two predictions as robust inferences from a theory which is neither unique nor able to account for the amplitudes of the peaks. The acausality at the epoch of last scattering on large angular scales could equally be created in the quantum chaos of the Planck epoch or even earlier, via pre-Big Bang physics, all that is required being phase coherence on superhorizon scales of matter and radiation fluctuations. The polarization signal of a relic gravity wave background presents the ultimate challenge, and the ultimate probe.

Most of this is for the future. At present, one has some noteworthy highlights. Gravitational instability theory of structure formation has been verified. The universe has been found to be spatially flat. The CMB radiation power spectrum has provoked the death of topological defects as a significant source of seeds for structure formation. A purely baryonic universe can be discarded. This is remarkable progress in modern cosmology.


format: text

text:
# Critical properties of loop percolation models with optimization constraints

## I Introduction

The percolation of loops (or closed strings) appears naturally in the context of liquid helium Wil89 ; Scha01 , early universe Wil99 ; SH97  and high-temperature superconductors NS98 ; PR02 , where loops represent world-lines, cosmic strings and vortex loops, respectively. In analogy to the characteristic size of a cluster in conventional site or bond percolation Sta85BH96 , the typical diameter $`\xi `$ of the loops diverges when approaching a critical point, the loop percolation transition. This transition shows power-law behavior at the critical point, which is described by a set of critical exponents that constitute a universality class.

In this paper we study these percolation transitions numerically. We show that the loop percolation (LP) model, in which each elementary plaquette of a square lattice (in $`2d`$) or on a simple cubic lattice (in $`3d`$) is occupied with a probability $`p`$ with an elementary loop, is in the same universality as the conventional $`d`$-dimensional bond percolation. More importantly we also show that in contrast to the LP model an optimization constraint for the loop configurations, which then have to minimize a particular generic energy function, leads to a percolation transition that constitutes a new universality class, for which we report the critical exponents.

These loop Hamiltonian (LH) models are relevant for the ground state properties of disordered solid-on-solid models RB97 ; PR00 ; ZKNM98  and vortex glasses KR98 . One particular example of was recently studied by us in the context of a $`3d`$ vortex glass model for amorphous high-$`T_c`$ superconductors in the strong screening limitPR02 , which shows an unconventional percolation transition of vortex loops in the ground state as a function of the disorder strength $`\sigma `$.

The paper is organized as follows: In section II, we introduce the models and the definition of loops (clusters). In section III we locate the percolation transition in each model and calculate the critical exponents using finite-size scaling (FSS). Section IV concludes the paper with a summary and a discussion.

## II Models

Consider a $`d`$-dimensional hyper-cubic lattice - i.e. a square lattice in $`2d`$ or a simple cubic lattice in $`3d`$ \- of linear size $`L`$ ($`L=7`$ in the $`2d`$ example in Fig.1) with free boundary conditions (f.b.c.). In the loop percolation (LP) model the elementary plaquettes of the lattice are occupied with elementary loops with a probability $`p_1`$. (There are $`(L1)^2`$ elementary plaquettes in $`2d`$ and $`3L(L1)^2`$ elementary plaquettes in $`3d`$.) An elementary loop consists of the four bonds belonging to an elementary plaquette plus a randomly chosen direction: either clockwise or counterclockwise both with probability $`1/2`$ (see Fig. 1). When two adjacent plaquettes are occupied by elementary loops of same orientation we cancel the occupation of the common bond as indicated in Fig. 1.

We can identify the resulting (directed) bond configuration of the LP model with a flow $`𝐧=\{n_1,n_2,\mathrm{},n_M\}`$, where $`n_i`$ is an integer and $`M`$ is the number of bonds in the lattice. We say that $`n_i=0`$ if bond $`i`$ is not occupied, $`n_i=\pm 1`$ if it is singly occupied in the positive (negative) direction (positive and negative are defined by the introduction of an appropriate coordinate system), $`n_i=\pm 2`$ if it is doubly occupied etc. Thus, an elementary loop (e.g. in the $`xy`$ plane) can be represented by $`n_{x,y}=n_{x+1,y}=n_{x+1,y+1}=n_{x,y+1}=1`$ if oriented counterclockwise, as shown in Fig. 1. The complete flow $`𝐧`$ then can simply be thought of as the sum of all elementary loops. Obviously, in this sum the flow variables on the common bonds of adjacent elementary loops cancel arithmetically. Moreover, the construction of this flow via addition of elementary loops implies that on each site of the lattice the number of ingoing arrows balances the number of outgoing arrows (see Fig. 1): one says that this flow is divergence free

$$n_i=0.$$
(1)
(The lattice-divergence operator is defined on each lattice site and sums simply all $`2d`$ flow variables of the bonds connected to it).

In analogy to conventional bond percolation we are now going to define the clusters of a configuration of the LP model: Two occupied bonds belong to the same cluster if they have one site in common. Thus, all bonds of the cluster can be connected via a directed path along occupied bonds belonging to this cluster, which is analogous to conventional bond percolation - up to the attribute directed. This is actually a slightly non-trivial observation - see Fig. 1 to exemplify this statement - because an occupied directed bond cannot be traversed in the opposite direction, but is a direct consequence of the fact that a cluster is also a sum of elementary loops.

The mass $`m`$ of a cluster is the number of occupied bonds, where a bond $`i`$ with a flow $`n_i`$ counts $`|n_i|`$ times, i.e. has mass $`m_i=|n_i|`$. A percolating cluster is a cluster spanning the entire system (in at least one of the $`d`$ directions). This implies that the cluster contains a directed path along its occupied bonds from one side of the lattice to the opposite. In the following we refer to the cluster just defined as a loop.

The representation of the configuration of directed occupied bonds as a flow $`𝐧`$ is now used to define the LP model with an optimization constraint: In contrast to the stochastic uncorrelated occupation of elementary loops in the LP model above, we now consider a different type of occupation of loops, which results from the minimization of an energy function for a loop configuration $`𝐧`$

$$H=H\{𝐧\}=\underset{i=1}{\overset{M}{}}f_i(n_i),$$
(2)
where the sum is over all bonds $`i`$ on a $`d`$-dimensional hyper-cubic $`L^d`$ lattice with periodic boundary conditions (p.b.c). Herewith we assume the energy function to be composed of solely of local terms $`f_i(n)`$ with $`f_i(n)0`$ and convex (i.e. $`f^{\prime \prime }(n)0`$) for all bonds $`i`$ and flow (or occupation) values $`n`$. Such energy functions are relevant in the context of disordered solid-on-solid models (in $`2d`$) RB97 ; PR00 ; ZKNM98  and vortex glasses (in $`3d`$) KR98  since they determine their ground states. One has to keep in mind, that the loop condition (1) has to be fulfilled — i.e. the optimization task consist in finding the minimum of (2) under the constraint (1)!

For $`f_i(n)=f(n)`$ independent of the bond index the minimum is trivial: $`n=0`$, i.e. no bond is occupied. Only if the minima of local cost functions vary from bind index to bind index in a non-trivial way one can expect a non-trivial loop configuration. We assume a random distribution of these minima (at values $`b_i`$) and restrict ourselves to a quadratic form of $`f_i(n)`$ around these minima: $`f_i(n_i)=(n_ib_i)^2`$, which means that we study the loop configurations (i.e. occupied bond configurations that fulfill (1)) that minimize

$$H=\underset{i}{}(n_ib_i)^2.$$
(3)
The random variables $`b_i`$ are uniformly distributed $`b_i[2\sigma ,2\sigma ]`$ at a fixed disorder strength $`\sigma [0,1]`$. Here, the probability $`p`$ to occupy a bond depends on the disorder strength $`\sigma `$. We refer to the LP model with an optimization constraint of Hamiltonian (3) as the loop Hamiltonian model. For the minimization of a free energy (optimization) we restrict to the calculation of the ground state ($`T=0`$) configuration $`𝐧`$, which is a minimum cost flow problem that can be solved exactly in polynomial time with appropriate algorithmsHR02 .

## III Results

We use a depth-first search algorithm known from combinatorial optimization HR02  to identify the connected loops. The number of realizations we used to get statistically averaged data varied from 500 for the largest system size to 20000 for the smallest system size. In the following the error bars of our data in the figures are smaller than the symbol size and are therefore omitted.

Fig. 2 and 3 depict three typical loop configurations of the LP and LH model around the critical threshold, respectively, which clearly indicates a percolation phase transition for both models.

### III.1 Loop percolation model (LP)

First, we study the LP model and consider the probability $`P^{perc}`$ that a loop percolates the system. Since we assume to have only one typical length scale, which diverges at the critical point like $`\xi |p_1p_{1c}|^\nu `$, in a finite system $`P^{perc}`$ is expected to scale like

$$P^{perc}(L)\overline{P}[(p_1p_{1c})L^{1/\nu }].$$
(4)
Thus, $`P^{perc}(L)`$ is independent of $`L`$ at $`p_{1c}`$ and the data curves should intersect for different system sizes $`L`$. From our raw data in the inset of Fig.4 (left) we locate the critical point $`p_{1c}=0.4070\pm 0.0005`$ in $`2d`$ and $`p_{1c}=0.0793\pm 0.0004`$ in $`3d`$, respectively. We plot the scaling assumption (4) in Fig. 4 (left) and estimate the inverse correlation length exponent $`1/\nu =0.75\pm 0.03`$ in $`2d`$ and $`1/\nu =1.143\pm 0.090`$ in $`3d`$ from the best data collapse at fixed $`p_{1c}`$.

To get a second critical exponent we consider the probability $`P_{\mathrm{}}`$ that a bond belongs to the percolating loop, i.e. the order parameter, which is expected to obey

$$P_{\mathrm{}}(L)L^{\beta /\nu }\overline{P}[(p_1p_{1c})L^{1/\nu }].$$
(5)
Fig. 4 (middle) shows the raw data (inset) and the plot of the scaling law (5) with $`\beta /\nu =0.104\pm 0.020`$ in $`2d`$ and $`\beta /\nu =0.49\pm 0.02`$ in $`3d`$ such as to achieve the best data collapse. From the $`\nu `$ above we determine $`\beta `$ shown in Table 1.

At the critical point $`p_{c1}`$ the average number $`n_m`$ of finite loops of mass $`m`$ per lattice bond scales like

$$n_m(L,p_1=p_{1c})m^\tau ,$$
(6)
where $`\tau `$ is the Fisher exponent Sta85BH96 ; Fis67 . Since we assume the usual scaling relations of conventional percolation to be valid Sta85BH96 , we also expect a combination of them to be valid, i.e. the hyperscaling relation

$$\tau =\frac{2\beta /(d\nu )}{1\beta /(d\nu )},$$
(7)
where $`d`$ is the spatial dimension. From the fit of the data of $`n_m(L)`$ at $`p_{c1}`$ in Fig. 4 (right) we get $`\tau `$ depicted in Table 1. This is consistent with the value from putting the above $`\nu `$ and $`\beta `$ into Eq. (7), i.e. $`\tau =2.05\pm 0.05`$ in $`2d`$ and $`\tau =2.20\pm 0.06`$ in $`3d`$.

To determine the critical probability $`p_c`$ that a bond is occupied we calculate

$$p_c(L)=\underset{m=4}{\overset{m_L}{}}mn_m(L;p_1=p_{1c}),$$
(8)
where $`m_L`$ is the largest finite loop. We plot $`p_c(L)`$ versus $`1/L`$ as depicted in Fig. 6 and extract $`p_c`$ from the limit $`L\mathrm{}`$.

In addition to the results presented so far, we found that the mean number $`N^{perc}`$ of percolating loops per sample in the finite system can be described by a smeared step function with an upper boundary $`N^{perc}=1`$ as known from conventional percolation Sta85BH96 . When we define the mass $`m_i`$ of an occupied bond $`i`$ to be $`m_i=1`$ even for $`|n_i|>1`$, the critical scaling behavior remains unchanged and the critical probability becomes $`p_c=0.565\pm 0.005`$ in $`2d`$ and $`p_c=0.266\pm 0.005`$ in $`3d`$, respectively. We also studied the case, where the algorithm detects the loops along oriented paths, and found the same results, as expected from what we said above.

### III.2 Loop hamiltonian model (LH)

For the loop Hamiltonian (3) we perform analogous data analysis. From the intersection of the $`L`$-dependent curves of $`P^{perc}(L)`$ in the inset of Fig. 5 (left) we locate the critical disorder strength at $`\sigma _c=0.458\pm 0.001`$ in $`2d`$ and $`\sigma _c=0.3129\pm 0.0005`$ in $`3d`$, respectively. From the finite-size scaling behavior of the percolation probability $`P^{perc}`$ (similar to Eq. (4)) we get $`1/\nu =0.30\pm 0.05`$ in $`2d`$ and $`1/\nu =0.95\pm 0.05`$ in $`3d`$. The resulting exponent $`\nu `$ are given in Table 1. In $`2d`$ we find a value $`\nu =3.3\pm 0.3`$, which is rather large.

Fig. 5 (middle) shows the plot of the raw data of $`P_{\mathrm{}}`$ (inset) and its scaling law similar to Eq. (5) with $`\beta /\nu =0.55\pm 0.05`$ in $`2d`$ and $`\beta /\nu =1.30\pm 0.05`$ in $`3d`$. From the $`\nu `$ above we determine $`\beta `$ in Table 1.

In Fig. 5 (right) we plot the loop distribution $`n_m(L)`$ vs. the mass $`m`$ at the critical point $`\sigma _c`$ and determine $`\tau `$ by power law fit, which gives the values shown in Table 1. From $`\nu `$ and $`\beta `$ above we get via the hyperscaling relation (7) the Fisher exponent $`\tau =2.38\pm 0.17`$ in $`2d`$ and $`\tau =2.76\pm 0.26`$ in $`3d`$, which are consistent with the values from the power-law fit within the error bars.

In Fig. 7 we plot the mean number $`N^{perc}`$ of percolating loops per sample. The different curves of $`N^{perc}(L)`$ intersect at the same critical point $`\sigma _c`$ found for $`P^{perc}`$ above. Similar to the scaling law of $`N_{conv.}^{perc}(L)`$ in conventional percolation Sta85BH96  we expect $`N^{perc}(L)`$ to obey

$$N^{perc}(L)\overline{N}[(\sigma \sigma _c)L^{1/\nu }],$$
(9)
and estimate the same $`\nu `$ as above from the best data collapse, see Fig. 7.

The mean number $`N^{perc}`$ of percolating loops per sample can become larger than one slightly above the critical point $`\sigma _c`$ in contrast to conventional percolation, where only one percolating cluster exists for $`p>p_c`$. The appearance of several percolating loops can possibly be related to the fact that the loop density in the LH model at $`\sigma _c`$ is much smaller than in the LP model, as can be seen from comparison of typical loop configurations (c.f. Fig. 2 and 3). Moreover, the maximum of $`N^{perc}(L)`$ seems to increase with increasing $`L`$. From our data we could not determine the behavior of the maximum of $`N^{perc}(L)`$ in the thermodynamic limit $`L\mathrm{}`$, in particular whether it converges to a constant or diverges. We also checked a $`L`$-dependent power law behavior of $`N^{perc}(L)`$ similar to Eq. (5) with a new critical exponent $`x`$ (instead of $`\beta `$) and found $`x/\nu =0.01\pm 0.01`$ in $`2d`$ and $`x/\nu =0.15\pm 0.02`$ in $`3d`$, i.e. $`x`$ close to zero.

Finally, we calculate the probability $`p_c(L)`$ that a bond is occupied (analogous to Eq. 8) for different $`L`$ at the critical point $`\sigma _c`$ as shown in Fig. 6 and extract $`p_c`$ as the average value, see Table 1.

In all considered ground state configurations of the loop Hamiltonian (3) we found a bond to be empty or singly occupied only. Due to this observation we also investigated - beside the study presented this paper - a modified LP model, in which a plaquette is allowed to be occupied with $`p_1`$ if and only if the amount of the resulting flow $`𝐧`$ is $`|n_i|1`$. Here, the algorithm checked each plaquette to be occupied or not in positional order. Note that this occupation process depends on the algorithmic order of occupying plaquettes in the system. Again, we found the same critical exponents as known from conventional percolation, but a different critical probability $`p_{1c}`$.

We also studied the $`2d`$ LH model with a different probability distribution function $`P(b_i)`$, where $`b_i`$ is given by a sum of two uniformly distributed random numbers out of $`[0,2\sigma ]`$. This corresponds to the solid-on-solid (SOS) model on a disordered substrate, which has been studied RB97 ; PR00  only at $`\sigma =1/2`$ yet. For this probability distribution function we get the same critical exponents as found above, but with a different critical point at $`\sigma _c=0.395\pm 0.005`$, i.e. $`p_c=0.34\pm 0.02`$. This implies that our study is relevant to describe a disorder-driven flat-to-superrough phase transition, not studied in literature yet.

Closely related to the SOS model is the $`2d`$ model of a random elastic medium with contour loops, for which Zeng et al. found ZKNM98  the geometrical exponents $`\beta /\nu =dd_f=0.54\pm 0.01`$ and $`\tau =2.32\pm 0.01`$ at $`\sigma =1/2`$. These exponents agree with the critical $`\beta /\nu =0.55\pm 0.05`$ and $`\tau =2.38\pm 0.17`$ we found here at $`\sigma _c0.458`$.

## IV Summary

We studied two loop percolation models, numerically: in the loop percolation (LP) model the loop configuration resulted from an uncorrelated unbiased random occupation of elementary directed plaquettes, while in the loop Hamiltonian (LH) model the loop configuration appeared according to the Boltzmann weight of a particular microscopic model at $`T=0`$, i.e. from an optimization constraint (1) of a Hamiltonian (3). Our results are summarized in Table 1.

We found that in $`2d`$ and $`3d`$ the LP model belongs to the universality class of the conventional (bond or site) percolation Sta85BH96 . A plausible explanation for this observation is the following: We map an occupied (empty) plaquette onto a occupied (empty) site on an appropriate lattice. Fig. 8 illustrates the mapping in $`2d`$: the two loops on a square lattice of system size $`L`$, Fig. 8 (left), are mapped onto two clusters consisting of 2 and 4 occupied sites on a (dual) square lattice of size $`L1`$, Fig. 8 (right). The resulting clusters of sites are clusters of finite extended objects like k-mers in Ref. LP94 , which show the same universal behavior at the percolation transition as conventional site percolation Sta85BH96 . Also we found that the non-trivial orientation of the loops in the LP model is irrelevant for the universality class. We expect that this also holds for higher spatial dimensions $`d`$ with the same critical dimension $`d_c=6`$ as for conventional percolation Sta85BH96 ; Car97 .

For the loop Hamiltonian (LH) model Eq. (3) we found evidence for an unconventional universality class of percolation in $`2d`$ and $`3d`$, the exponents are listed in table I. In $`2d`$, we obtained a rather large correlation length exponent $`\nu =3.3\pm 0.3`$ , which possibly indicates an infinite critical exponent for $`L\mathrm{}`$ known from the Kosterlitz-Touless (KT) phase transition KT . On the other hand, since our Hamiltonian (3) has no XY, a Kosterlitz-Touless (KT) transition can be ruled out. Indeed, from applying a KT-form of finite-size scaling to our data, we could not find any acceptable data collapse. We like to remark that loop percolation with a large correlation exponent $`\nu `$ also appears in integer Quantum Hall systems, where the loops represent equipotential lines CRSR01 .

It would be interesting to study the universal behavior of the pure (i.e. $`\sigma =0`$) LH model (3) for finite temperatures $`T`$. In $`3d`$, such a thermal-driven loop percolation phase transition has been studied NS98  for a different model.

###### Acknowledgements.

We thank Jae Dong Noh for fruitful discussions and stimulating ideas. This work has been supported financially by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).


text:
# Extensorspublished: Advances in Applied Clifford Algebras 11(S3), 23-40 (2001).

## 1 Introduction

In this second paper of a series of seven we introduce the so-called *extensors,* and develop some aspects of their theory with considerable detail. We give special names and study in detail some important cases of extensors which will appear frequently in future developments of ours theories. The *extension, adjoint* and *generalization* operators are introduced and their main properties are determined. In particular, the generalization operator plays a crucial role in our theory of covariant derivative operators on smooth manifolds to be presented in a forthcoming series of papers. We define moreover the concept of determinant of a $`(1,1)`$-extensor (a scalar which is an characteristic invariant associated to the extensor), and obtain their basic properties which are very similar, but not identical, to the classical determinat of a real square matrix. We present some preliminary applications of the concept of extensor which will be useful later. In particular, we present the concept of the *changing basis extensor*, and derive also an interesting formula for the inversion of $`(1,1)`$-extensors. Some related, but not equivalent material, appears in ( ,).

## 2 General $`k`$-Extensors

Let $`V`$ be a real vector space of finite dimension, and let $`V^{}`$ be its dual space. Denote by $`^pV`$ the space of $`p`$-vectors over $`V.`$ Recall that if $`dimV=n`$, then $`dim^pV=\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{p}\right)`$.

As defined in paper I  a multivector over $`V`$ is simply a formal sum of scalar, vector,$`\mathrm{}`$, pseudovector and pseudoscalar. The space of these objects has been denoted by $`V`$, i.e., $`V=+V+\mathrm{}+^{n1}V+^nV`$. Recall that if $`dimV=n`$ then $`dimV=2^n`$.

Let $`\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V,\mathrm{},\underset{k}{\overset{}{}}V`$ to $`\stackrel{}{}V`$ be $`k+1`$ subspaces of $`V`$ such that each of them is any sum of homogeneous subspaces of $`V,`$ and $`\stackrel{}{}V`$ be either any sum of homogeneous subspaces of $`V`$ or the trivial subspace $`\{0\}.`$ A multilinear mapping from the cartesian product $`\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V\times \mathrm{}\times \underset{k}{\overset{}{}}V`$ to $`\stackrel{}{}V`$ will be called a *general* $`k`$-*extensor* over $`V,`$ i.e., $`t:\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V\times \mathrm{}\times \underset{k}{\overset{}{}}V`$ $``$ $`\stackrel{}{}V`$ such that for any $`\alpha _j,\alpha _j^{}`$ and $`X_j,X_j^{}\underset{j}{\overset{}{}}V`$

$$t(\mathrm{},\alpha _jX_j+\alpha _j^{}X_j^{},\mathrm{})=\alpha _jt(\mathrm{},X_j,\mathrm{})+\alpha _j^{}t(\mathrm{},X_j^{},\mathrm{}),$$
(1)
for each $`j`$ with $`1jk.`$

It should be noticed that the linear operators on $`V,`$ $`^pV`$ or $`V`$ which appear in ordinary linear algebra are particular cases of $`1`$-extensors over $`V`$. A covariant $`k`$-tensor over $`V`$ is just being a $`k`$-extensor over $`V`$.

In this way, the concept of general $`k`$-extensor generalizes and unifies both of the well-known concepts of linear operator and covariant $`k`$-tensor. These mathematical objects are of the same nature!

The set of general $`k`$-extensors over $`V,`$ denoted by the suggestive notation $`k`$-$`ext(\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V,\mathrm{},\underset{k}{\overset{}{}}V,\stackrel{}{}V),`$ has a natural structure of real vector space. Its dimension is given by noticeable formula

$$dimk\text{-}ext(\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V,\mathrm{},\underset{k}{\overset{}{}}V;\stackrel{}{}V)=dim\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V\mathrm{}dim\underset{k}{\overset{}{}}Vdim\stackrel{}{}V.$$
(2)
We shall need to consider only some particular cases of these general $`k`$-extensors over $`V.`$ So, special names and notations will be given for them.

We will equip $`V`$ with an arbitrary (but fixed, once and for all) euclidean metric $`G_E.`$ And as usual we will denote the scalar product of multivectors $`X,YV`$ with respect to the euclidean metric structure $`(V,G_E),`$ namely $`X\underset{G_E}{}Y,`$ by the more simple notation $`XY.`$

Let $`\{e_j\}`$ be any basis for $`V,`$ and $`\{e^j\}`$ be its euclidean reciprocal basis for $`V,`$ i.e., $`e_je^k=\delta _j^k`$.

### 2.1 $`(p,q)`$-Extensors

Let $`p`$ and $`q`$ be two integer numbers with $`0p,qn`$. A linear mapping which sends $`p`$-vectors to $`q`$-vectors will be called a $`(p,q)`$-*extensor* over $`V.`$ The space of them, namely $`1`$-$`ext(^pV;^qV),`$ will be denoted by $`ext_p^q(V)`$ for short. By using eq.(2) we get

$$dimext_p^q(V)=\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{p}\right)\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{q}\right).$$
(3)
For instance, we see that the $`(1,1)`$-extensors over $`V`$ are just the linear operators on $`V.`$

The set of $`\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{p}\right)\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{q}\right)`$ extensors belonging to $`ext_p^q(V),`$ namely $`\epsilon ^{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q},`$ defined by

$$\epsilon ^{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}(X)=(e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_p})Xe^{k_1}\mathrm{}e^{k_q},$$
(4)
for all $`X^pV,`$ is a $`(p,q)`$-extensor basis for $`ext_p^q(V).`$

This set of extensors are indeed linearly independent, and for each $`text_p^q(V)`$ there exist $`\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{p}\right)\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{q}\right)`$ real numbers, say $`t_{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q},`$ given by

$$t_{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}=t(e_{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_p})(e_{k_1}\mathrm{}e_{k_q})$$
(5)
such that

$$t=\frac{1}{p!}\frac{1}{q!}t_{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}\epsilon ^{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}.$$
(6)
Such $`t_{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ will be called the $`j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q`$-th *covariant components* of $`t`$ with respect to the $`(p,q)`$-*extensor basis* $`\{\epsilon ^{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}\}.`$

Of course, there are still other $`(p,q)`$-extensor bases for $`ext_p^q(V)`$ besides the ones given by eq.(4) which can be constructed with the vector bases $`\{e_j\}`$ and $`\{e^j\}`$ of $`V`$. Indeed, there are $`2^{p+q}`$ of such $`(p,q)`$-extensor bases for $`ext_p^q(V).`$ For instance, if we use the basis $`(p,q)`$-extensors $`\epsilon _{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ and the real numbers $`t^{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ defined by

$`\epsilon _{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}(X)`$ $`=(e_{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_p})Xe_{k_1}\mathrm{}e_{k_q},`$ (7)
$`t^{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ $`=t(e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_p})(e^{k_1}\mathrm{}e^{k_q}),`$ (8)
we get an expansion formula for $`text_p^q(V)`$ analogous to that given by eq.(6), i.e.,

$$t=\frac{1}{p!}\frac{1}{q!}t^{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}\epsilon _{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}.$$
(9)
Such $`t^{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ are called the $`j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q`$-th *contravariant components* of $`t`$ with respect to the $`(p,q)`$-*extensor basis* $`\{\epsilon _{j_1\mathrm{}j_p;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}\}.`$

### 2.2 Extensors

A linear mapping which sends multivectors to multivectors will be simply called an *extensor* over $`V.`$ They are the linear operators on $`V.`$ For the space of extensors over $`V,`$ namely $`1`$-$`ext(V;V),`$ we will use the short notation $`ext(V).`$ By using eq.(2) we get

$$dimext(V)=2^n2^n.$$
(10)
For instance, we will see that the so-called Hodge star operator is just being a well-defined extensor over $`V`$ which can be also thought as $`(p,np)`$-extensor over $`V.`$ The so-called extended of $`text_1^1(V)`$ is just being an extensor over $`V,`$ i.e., $`\underset{¯}{t}ext(V).`$

There are $`2^n2^n`$ extensors over $`V,`$ namely $`\epsilon ^{J;K},`$ given by111$`J`$ and $`K`$ are colective indices. Recall, for example, that: $`e_J=1,e_{j_1},e_{j_1}e_{j_2},\mathrm{}`$($`e^J=1,e^{j_1},e^{j_1}e^{j_2},\mathrm{}`$) and $`\nu (J)=0,1,2,\mathrm{}`$ for $`J=\mathrm{},j_1,j_1j_2,\mathrm{},`$ where all index $`j_1,j_2,\mathrm{}`$ runs from $`1`$ to $`n.`$

$$\epsilon ^{J;K}(X)=(e^JX)e^K,$$
(11)
for all $`XV,`$ which set extensor bases for $`ext(V).`$

In fact they are lineary independent, and for each $`text(V)`$ there exist $`2^n2^n`$ real numbers, say $`t_{J;K},`$ given by

$$t_{J;K}=t(e_J)e_K$$
(12)
such that

$$t=\underset{𝐽}{}\underset{𝐾}{}\frac{1}{\nu (J)!}\frac{1}{\nu (K)!}t_{J;K}\epsilon ^{J;K}.$$
(13)
Such $`t_{J;K}`$ will be called the $`J;K`$-th *covariant components* of $`t`$ with respect to the *extensor basis* $`\{\epsilon ^{J;K}\}.`$

We notice that exactly $`(2^{n+1}1)^2`$ extensor bases for $`ext(V)`$ can be constructed from the vector bases $`\{e_j\}`$ and $`\{e^j\}`$ of $`V.`$ For instance, whenever the basis extensors $`\epsilon _{J;K}`$ and the real numbers $`t^{J;K}`$ defined by

$`\epsilon _{J;K}(X)`$ $`=(e_JX)e_K,`$ (14)
$`t^{J;K}`$ $`=t(e^J)e^K`$ (15)
are being used, an expansion formula for $`text(V)`$ analogous to that given by eq.(13) can be obtained, i.e.,

$$t=\underset{𝐽}{}\underset{𝐾}{}\frac{1}{\nu (J)!}\frac{1}{\nu (K)!}t^{J;K}\epsilon _{J;K}.$$
(16)
Such $`t^{J;K}`$ are called the $`J;K`$-th *contravariant components* of $`t`$ with respect to the *extensor basis* $`\{\epsilon _{J;K}\}`$.

### 2.3 Elementary $`k`$-Extensors

A multilinear mapping which takes $`k`$-uple of vectors into $`q`$-vectors will be called an *elementary* $`k`$-*extensor* over $`V`$of degree $`q.`$ The space of them, namely $`k`$-$`ext(V,\mathrm{},V;^qV),`$ will be denoted by $`k`$-$`ext^q(V).`$ It is easy to verify by using eq.(2) that

$$dimk\text{-}ext^q(V)=n^k\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{q}\right).$$
(17)
It should be noticed that aelementary $`k`$-extensor over $`V`$ of degree $`0`$ is just being a *covariant* $`k`$-*tensor* over $`V,`$ i.e., $`k`$-$`ext^0(V)T_k(V).`$ It is easily realized that $`1`$-$`ext^q(V)ext_1^q(V).`$

The elementary $`k`$-extensors of degrees $`0,1,2,\mathrm{}`$ etc. are sometimes said to be *scalar*, *vector,* *bivector*, $`\mathrm{}`$ etc. *elementary* $`k`$-*extensors.*

There are $`n^k\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{q}\right)`$ elementary $`k`$-extensors of degree $`q`$ belonging to $`k`$-$`ext^q(V),`$ namely $`\epsilon ^{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q},`$ defined by

$$\epsilon ^{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}(v_1,\mathrm{},v_k)=(v_1e^{j_1})\mathrm{}(v_ke^{j_k})e^{k_1}\mathrm{}e^{k_q},$$
(18)
for all $`(v_1,\mathrm{},v_k)\underset{k\text{ copies}}{\underset{}{V\times \mathrm{}\times V}},`$ which set elementary $`k`$-extensor of degree $`q`$ bases for $`k`$-$`ext^q(V).`$

In fact they are linearly independent, and for all $`tk`$-$`ext^q(V)`$ there are $`n^k\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{q}\right)`$ real numbers, say $`t_{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q},`$ given by

$$t_{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}=t(e_{j_1},\mathrm{},e_{j_k})(e_{k_1}\mathrm{}e_{k_q})$$
(19)
such that

$$t=\frac{1}{q!}t_{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}\epsilon ^{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}.$$
(20)
Such $`t_{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ will be called the $`j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q`$-th *covariant components* of $`t`$ with respect to the *bases* $`\{\epsilon ^{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}\}.`$

We notice that exactly $`2^{k+q}`$ elementary $`k`$-extensors of degree $`q`$ bases for $`k`$-$`ext^q(V)`$ can be constructed from the vector bases $`\{e_j\}`$ and $`\{e^j\}`$ of $`V`$. For instance, we might define the basis elementary $`k`$-extensor of degree $`q`$ $`\epsilon _{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ and the real numbers $`t^{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ by the following equations

$`\epsilon _{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}(v_1,\mathrm{},v_k)`$ $`=(v_1e_{j_1})\mathrm{}(v_ke_{j_k})e_{k_1}\mathrm{}e_{k_q},`$ (21)
$`t^{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ $`=t(e^{j_1},\mathrm{},e^{j_k})(e^{k_1}\mathrm{}e^{k_q}).`$ (22)
Then, we might have other expansion formula for $`tk`$-$`ext^q(V)`$ than that given by eq.(20), i.e.,

$$t=\frac{1}{q!}t^{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}\epsilon _{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}.$$
(23)
Such $`t^{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}`$ are called the $`j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q`$-th *contravariant components* of $`t`$ with respect to the *basis* $`\{\epsilon _{j_1,\mathrm{},j_k;k_1\mathrm{}k_q}\}.`$

Note that $`1`$-$`ext^p(V)ext_1^p(V)`$.

A completely skew-symmetric $`k`$-extensor over $`V`$ of degree $`p`$ ($`k2`$), i.e., $`\mathrm{\Theta }k`$-$`ext^p(V)`$ such that for any $`v_i,v_jV`$ with $`1i<jk,`$

$$\mathrm{\Theta }(v_1,\mathrm{},v_i,\mathrm{},v_j,\mathrm{},v_k)=\mathrm{\Theta }(v_1,\mathrm{},v_j,\mathrm{},v_i,\mathrm{},v_k)$$
(24)
will be called a $`k`$*-exform over* $`V`$ *of degree* $`p.`$

The vector space of $`k`$-exforms over $`V`$ of degree $`p`$ will be denoted by $`k`$-$`exf^p(V).`$

It is also convenient to define a $`0`$-exform of degree $`p`$ to be a $`p`$-vector (i.e., $`0`$-$`exf^p(V)=^pV`$) and an $`1`$-exform of degree $`p`$ to be a $`1`$-extensor of degree $`p`$ (i.e., $`1`$-$`exf^p(V)=1`$-$`ext^p(V)`$).

If $`dimV=n,`$ then $`dimk`$-$`exf^p(V)=\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{k}\right)\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{p}\right).`$

The $`k`$-exforms of degree $`0,1,2,\mathrm{}`$ etc. are said to be ‘scalar $`k`$-exforms’, vector $`k`$-exforms’, ‘bivector $`k`$-exforms’,$`\mathrm{}`$ etc.

Note that a scalar $`k`$-exform is just a $`k`$-form, i.e., $`k`$-$`exf^0(V)=^kV.`$ In this way, we see that the concept of $`k`$-exform generalizes the concept of $`k`$-form.

## 3 Projectors

Let $`\stackrel{}{}V`$ be either any sum of homogeneous subspaces222Note that for such a subspace $`\stackrel{}{}V`$ there are $`\nu `$ integers $`p_{1,}\mathrm{},p_\nu `$ ($`0p_1<\mathrm{}<p_\nu n`$) such that $`\stackrel{}{}V=^{p_1}V+\mathrm{}+^{p_\nu }V.`$ of $`V`$ or the trivial subspace $`\{0\}.`$ Associated to $`^{}V,`$ a noticeable extensor from $`V`$ to $`\stackrel{}{}V,`$ namely $`_\stackrel{}{}V,`$ can defined by

$$X_\stackrel{}{}V=\{\begin{array}{cc}X_{p_1}+\mathrm{}+X_{p_\nu },& \text{if }\stackrel{}{}V=^{p_1}V+\mathrm{}+^{p_\nu }V\\ 0,& \text{if }\stackrel{}{}V=\{0\}\end{array}.$$
(25)
Such $`_\stackrel{}{}V1`$-$`ext(V;\stackrel{}{}V)`$ will be called the $`^{}V`$-*projector extensor*.

We notice that if $`\stackrel{}{}V`$ is any homogeneous subspace of $`V,`$ i.e., $`\stackrel{}{}V=^pV,`$ then the projector extensor is reduced to the so-called $`p`$-*part operator*, i.e., $`_\stackrel{}{}V=_p.`$

We now summarize the fundamental properties for the $`\stackrel{}{}V`$-projector extensors.

Let $`\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V`$ and $`\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V`$ be two subspaces of $`V.`$ If each of them is either any sum of homogeneous subspaces of $`V`$ or the trivial subspace $`\{0\},`$ then

$`X_{\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V}_{\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V}`$ $`=X_{\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V}`$ (26)
$`X_{\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V}+X_{\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V}`$ $`=X_{\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V}.`$ (27)
Let $`\stackrel{}{}V`$ be either any sum of homogeneous subspaces of $`V`$ or the trivial subspace $`\{0\}.`$ It holds

$$X_\stackrel{}{}VY=XY_\stackrel{}{}V.$$
(28)
In this sense we might say that the concept of $`\stackrel{}{}V`$-projector extensor is just a well-done generalization of the concept of $`p`$-part operator.

## 4 The Extension Operator

Let $`\{e_j\}`$ be any basis for $`V,`$ and $`\{\epsilon ^j\}`$ be its dual basis for $`V^{}.`$ As we know, $`\{\epsilon ^j\}`$ is the unique $`1`$-form basis associated to the vector basis $`\{e_j\}`$ such that $`\epsilon ^j(e_i)=\delta _i^j.`$

The mapping333Observe that the extension operator is not a linear mapping. $`ext_1^1(V)t\underset{¯}{t}ext(V)`$ such that for any $`XV:`$ if $`X=X_0+\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}X_k,`$ then

$$\underset{¯}{t}(X)=X_0+\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{}}\frac{1}{k!}X_k(\epsilon ^{j_1},\mathrm{},\epsilon ^{j_k})t(e_{j_1})\mathrm{}t(e_{j_k})$$
(29)
will be called the *extension operator*. We call $`\underset{¯}{t}`$ the *extended* of $`t.`$ It is the well-known *outermorphism* of $`t`$ in the ordinary linear algebra.

The extension operator is well-defined since it does not depend on the choice of $`\{e_j\}.`$

We summarize now the basic properties satisfied by the extension operator.

e1 The extension operator is grade-preserving, i.e.,

$$\text{if }X^pV,\text{ then }\underset{¯}{t}(X)^pV.$$
(30)
It is an obvious result which follows from eq.(29).

e2 For any $`\alpha ,`$ $`vV`$ and $`v_1\mathrm{}v_k^kV`$ it holds

$`\underset{¯}{t}(\alpha )`$ $`=\alpha ,`$ (31)
$`\underset{¯}{t}(v)`$ $`=t(v),`$ (32)
$`\underset{¯}{t}(v_1\mathrm{}v_k)`$ $`=t(v_1)\mathrm{}t(v_k).`$ (33)
###### Proof.

The first statement trivially follows from eq.(29). The second one can easily be deduced from eq.(29) by recalling the elementary expansion formula for vectors and the linearity of extensors. In order to prove the third statement we will use the remarkable formulas: $`v_1\mathrm{}v_k(\omega ^1,\mathrm{},\omega ^k)=ϵ^{i_1\mathrm{}i_k}\omega ^1(v_{i_1})\mathrm{}\omega ^k(v_{i_k})`$ and $`w_{i_1}\mathrm{}w_{i_k}=ϵ_{i_1\mathrm{}i_k}w_1\mathrm{}w_k,`$ where $`v_1,\mathrm{},v_kV,`$ $`w_1,\mathrm{},w_kV`$ and $`\omega ^1,\mathrm{},\omega ^kV^{},`$ and the combinatorial formula $`ϵ^{i_1\mathrm{}i_k}ϵ_{i_1\mathrm{}i_k}=k!.`$ By recalling the elementary expansion formula for vectors and the linearity of extensors we have that

$`\underset{¯}{t}(v_1\mathrm{}v_k)`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}v_1\mathrm{}v_k(\epsilon ^{j_1},\mathrm{},\epsilon ^{j_k})t(e_{j_1})\mathrm{}t(e_{j_k})`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}ϵ^{i_1\mathrm{}i_k}\epsilon ^{j_1}(v_{i_1})\mathrm{}\epsilon ^{j_k}(v_{i_k})t(e_{j_1})\mathrm{}t(e_{j_k})`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}ϵ^{i_1\mathrm{}i_k}t(v_{i_1})\mathrm{}t(v_{i_k}),`$
$`=t(v_1)\mathrm{}t(v_k).`$
e3 For any $`X,YV`$ it holds

$$\underset{¯}{t}(XY)=\underset{¯}{t}(X)\underset{¯}{t}(Y).$$
(34)
It is an immediate result which follows from eq.(33).

We emphasize that the three fundamental properties as given by eq.(31), eq.(32) and eq.(34) together are completely equivalent to the *extension procedure* as defined by eq.(29).

We present next some important properties of the extension operator.

e4 Let us take $`s,text_1^1(V).`$ Then, the following result holds

$$\underset{¯}{st}=\underset{¯}{s}\underset{¯}{t}.$$
(35)
###### Proof.

It is enough to present the proofs for scalars and simple $`k`$-vectors. For $`\alpha ,`$ by using eq.(31), we get

$$\underset{¯}{st}(\alpha )=\alpha =\underset{¯}{s}(\alpha )=\underset{¯}{s}(\underset{¯}{t}(\alpha ))=\underset{¯}{s}\underset{¯}{t}(\alpha ).$$

For a simple $`k`$-vector $`v_1\mathrm{}v_k^kV,`$ by using eq.(33), we get

$`\underset{¯}{st}(v_1\mathrm{}v_k)`$ $`=st(v_1)\mathrm{}st(v_k)=s(t(v_1))\mathrm{}s(t(v_k))`$
$`=\underset{¯}{s}(t(v_1)\mathrm{}t(v_k))=\underset{¯}{s}(\underset{¯}{t}(v_1\mathrm{}v_k)),`$
$`=\underset{¯}{s}\underset{¯}{t}(v_1\mathrm{}v_k).`$
Next we can easily generalize to multivectors by linearity of extensors. It yields

$$\underset{¯}{st}(X)=\underset{¯}{s}\underset{¯}{t}(X).$$

e5 Let us take $`text_1^1(V)`$ with inverse $`t^1ext_1^1(V),`$ i.e., $`t^1t=tt^1=i_V.`$ Then, $`\underset{¯}{(t^1)}ext(V)`$ is the inverse of $`\underset{¯}{t}ext(V),`$ i.e.,

$$(\underset{¯}{t})^1=\underset{¯}{(t^1)}.$$
(36)
Indeed, by using eq.(35) and the obvious property $`\underset{¯}{i}_V=i_{\scriptscriptstyle V},`$ we have that

$$t^1t=tt^1=i_V\underset{¯}{(t^1)}\underset{¯}{t}=\underset{¯}{t}\underset{¯}{(t^1)}=i_{\scriptscriptstyle V}.$$

It means that the *inverse of the extended* of $`t`$ equals the *extended of the inverse* of $`t.`$

In accordance with the corollary above we might use a more simple notation $`\underset{¯}{t}^1`$ to denote both of $`(\underset{¯}{t})^1`$ and $`\underset{¯}{(t^1)}.`$

e6 Let $`\{e_j\}`$ be any basis for $`V,`$ and $`\{e^j\}`$ its euclidean reciprocal basis for $`V,`$ i.e., $`e_je^k=\delta _j^k.`$ There are two interesting and useful formulas for calculating the extended of $`text_1^1(V),`$ i.e.,

$`\underset{¯}{t}(X)`$ $`=1X+\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}(e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_k})Xt(e_{j_1})\mathrm{}t(e_{j_k})`$ (37)
$`=1X+\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}(e_{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_k})Xt(e^{j_1})\mathrm{}t(e^{j_k}).`$ (38)
## 5 Standard Adjoint Operator

Let as above $`\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V`$ and $`\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V`$ be two subspaces of $`V`$ such that each of them is either any sum of homogeneous subspaces of $`V.`$ Let $`\{e_j\}`$ and $`\{e^j\}`$ be two euclidean reciprocal bases to each other for $`V,`$ i.e., $`e_je^k=\delta _j^k.`$

The *standard adjoint operator* is the linear mapping $`1`$-$`ext(\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V;\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V)tt^{}1`$-$`ext(\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V;\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V)`$ such that for any $`Y\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V:`$

$`t^{}(Y)`$ $`=t(1_{\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V})Y+\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}t(e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_k}_{\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V})Ye_{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_k}`$ (39)
$`=t(1_{\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V})Y+\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}t(e_{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_k}_{\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V})Ye^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_k},`$ (40)
or into a more compact notation by employing the *colective index* $`J,`$

$`t^{}(Y)`$ $`=\underset{𝐽}{{\displaystyle }}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\nu (J)!}}t(e^J_{_1^{}V})Ye_J`$ (41)
$`=\underset{𝐽}{{\displaystyle }}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\nu (J)!}}t(e_J_{_1^{}V})Ye^J,`$ (42)
We call $`t^{}`$ the *standard adjoint extensor* of $`t.`$ It should be noticed the use of the $`\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V`$-projector extensor.

The standard adjoint operator is well-defined since the sums appearing in each of places above do not depend on the choice of $`\{e_j\}.`$

Let us take $`X\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V`$ and $`Y\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V`$. A straightforward calculation yields

$`Xt^{}(Y)`$ $`=\underset{𝐽}{{\displaystyle }}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\nu (J)!}}t(e^J_{_1^{}V})Y(Xe_J)`$
$`=t(\underset{𝐽}{{\displaystyle }}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\nu (J)!}}(Xe_J)e^J_{_1^{}V})Y`$
$`=t(X_{_1^{}V})Y,`$
i.e.,

$$Xt^{}(Y)=t(X)Y.$$
(43)
It is a generalization of the well-known property which holds for linear operators.

Let us take $`t1`$-$`ext(_1^{}V;_2^{}V)`$ and $`u1`$-$`ext(_2^{}V;_3^{}V).`$ We can note that $`ut1`$-$`ext(_1^{}V;_3^{}V)`$ and $`t^{}u^{}1`$-$`ext(_3^{}V;_1^{}V).`$ Then, let us take $`X_1^{}V`$ and $`Z_3^{}V,`$ by using eq.(43) we have that

$$X(ut)^{}(Z)=(ut)(X)Z=t(X)u^{}(Z)=X(t^{}u^{})(Z).$$

Hence, we get

$$(ut)^{}=t^{}u^{}.$$
(44)
Let us take $`t1`$-$`ext(^{}V;^{}V)`$ with inverse $`t^11`$-$`ext(^{}V;^{}V),`$ i.e., $`t^1t=tt^1=i_^{}V,`$ where $`i_^{}V1`$-$`ext(^{}V;^{}V)`$ is the so-called identity function for $`^{}V.`$ By using eq.(44) and the obvious property $`i_^{}V=i_^{}V^{},`$ we have that

$$t^1t=tt^1=i_^{}Vt^{}(t^1)^{}=(t^1)^{}t^{}=i_^{}V,$$

hence,

$$(t^{})^1=(t^1)^{},$$
(45)
i.e., the inverse of the adjoint of $`t`$ equals the adjoint of the inverse of $`t`$. In accordance with the above corollary it is possible to use a more simple symbol, say $`t^{},`$ to denote both of $`(t^{})^1`$ and $`(t^1)^{}.`$

Let us take $`text_1^1(V).`$ We note that $`\underset{¯}{t}ext(V)`$ and $`\underset{¯}{(t^{})}ext(V).`$ A straightforward calculation by using eqs.(37) and (38) yields

$`\underset{¯}{(t^{})}(Y)`$ $`=1Y+\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}(e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_k})Yt^{}(e_{j_1})\mathrm{}t^{}(e_{j_k})`$
$`=1Y+`$
$`\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}(e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_k})Yt^{}(e_{j_1})e_{p_1}e^{p_1}\mathrm{}t^{}(e_{j_k})e_{p_k}e^{p_k}`$
$`=1Y+\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}(e_{j_1}t(e_{p_1})e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_k}t(e_{p_k})e^{j_k})Ye^{p_1}\mathrm{}e^{p_k}`$
$`=\underset{¯}{t}(1)Y+\underset{k=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{k!}}\underset{¯}{t}(e_{p_1}\mathrm{}e_{p_k})Ye^{p_1}\mathrm{}e^{p_k}`$
$`=(\underset{¯}{t})^{}(Y).`$
Hence, we get

$$\underset{¯}{(t^{})}=(\underset{¯}{t})^{}.$$
(46)
This means that the extension operator commutes with the adjoint operator. In accordance with the property above we may use a more simple notation $`\underset{¯}{t}^{}`$ to denote without ambiguities both of $`\underset{¯}{(t^{})}`$ and $`(\underset{¯}{t})^{}`$.

In many applications the adjoint operator is used for the cases where $`\underset{1}{\overset{}{}}V=^pV`$ and $`\underset{2}{\overset{}{}}V=^qV`$ are homogenous subspaces of $`V`$. In this particular case the adjoint operator is simply a linear mapping acting on these vector spaces of extensors, namely $`ext_q^p(V)\mathit{϶}tt^{}ext_p^q(V).`$ We have from eq.(41) and eq.(42) the simple formulas

$`t^{}(Y)`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{p!}}\underset{¯}{t}(e_{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_p})Y(e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_p})`$ (47)
$`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{p!}}\underset{¯}{t}(e^{_{j_1}}\mathrm{}e^{_{j_p}})Y(e_{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_p}),`$ (48)
for all $`Y^qV,`$ where Einstein’s convention has been used.

## 6 The Generalization Operator

Let $`\{e_k\}`$ be any basis for $`V,`$ and $`\{e^k\}`$ be its euclidean reciprocal basis for $`V,`$ as we know, $`e_ke^l=\delta _k^l.`$

The linear mapping $`ext_1^1(V)t\underset{}{t}ext(V)`$ such that for any $`XV`$

$$\underset{}{t}(X)=t(e^k)(e_k\mathrm{}X)=t(e_k)(e^k\mathrm{}X)$$
(49)
will be called the *generalization operator.* We call $`\underset{}{t}`$ the *generalized of* $`t.`$

The generalization operator is well-defined since it does not depend on the choice of $`\{e_k\}.`$

We present now some important properties which are satisfied by the generalization operator.

g1 The generalization operator is grade-preserving, i.e.,

$$\text{if }X^kV,\text{ then }\underset{}{t}(X)^kV.$$
(50)
g2 The grade involution $`\widehat{}ext(V),`$ reversion $`\stackrel{~}{}ext(V),`$ and conjugation $`\overline{}ext(V)`$ commute with the generalization operator, i.e.,

$`\underset{}{t}(\widehat{X})`$ $`=\widehat{\underset{}{t}(X)},`$ (51)
$`\underset{}{t}(\stackrel{~}{X})`$ $`=\stackrel{~}{\underset{}{t}(X)},`$ (52)
$`\underset{}{t}(\overline{X})`$ $`=\overline{\underset{}{t}(X)}.`$ (53)
They are immediate consequences of the grade-preserving property.

g3 For any $`\alpha ,`$ $`vV`$ and $`X,YV`$ it holds

$`\underset{}{t}(\alpha )`$ $`=0,`$ (54)
$`\underset{}{t}(v)`$ $`=t(v),`$ (55)
$`\underset{}{t}(XY)`$ $`=\underset{}{t}(X)Y+X\underset{}{t}(Y).`$ (56)
The proof of eq.(54) and eq.(55) are left to the reader. Hint: $`v\mathrm{}\alpha =0`$ and $`v\mathrm{}w=vw.`$ Now, the identities: $`a\mathrm{}(XY)=(a\mathrm{}X)Y+\widehat{X}(a\mathrm{}Y)`$ and $`aX=\widehat{X}a,`$ with $`aV`$ and $`X,YV,`$ allow us to prove the property given by eq.(56).

We can prove that the basic properties given by eq.(54), eq.(55) and eq.(56) together are completely equivalent to the *generalization procedure* as defined by eq.(49).

g4 The generalization operator commutes with the adjoint operator, i.e.,

$$(\underset{}{t})^{}=\underset{}{(t^{})},$$
(57)
or put it on another way, the *adjoint of the generalized* of $`t`$ is just the *generalized of the adjoint* of $`t.`$

###### Proof.

A straightforward calculation, by using eq.(43) and the multivector identities: $`X(aY)=(a\mathrm{}X)Y`$ and $`X(a\mathrm{}Y)=(aX)Y,`$ with $`aV`$ and $`X,YV,`$ gives

$`(\underset{}{t})^{}(X)Y`$ $`=X\underset{}{t}(Y)`$
$`=(e_j(t(e^j)\mathrm{}X))Y=(e_j(t(e^j)e^ke_k\mathrm{}X))Y`$
$`=(e^jt^{}(e^k)e_j(e_k\mathrm{}X))Y=(t^{}(e^k)(e_k\mathrm{}X))Y`$
$`=\underset{}{(t^{})}(X)Y.`$
Hence, by non-degeneracy of the euclidean scalar product, the required result follows. ∎

In accordance with the above property we might use a more simple symbol $`\underset{}{t^{}}`$ to mean $`(\underset{}{t})^{}`$ and $`\underset{}{(t^{})}.`$

g5 The symmetric (skew-symmetric) part of the generalized of $`t`$ is just the generalized of the symmetric (skew-symmetric) part of $`t,`$ i.e.,

$$(\underset{}{t})_\pm =(\underset{}{t_\pm }).$$
(58)
This property follows immediately from eq.(57).

We see also that it is possible to use the more simple notation $`\underset{}{t}_\pm `$ to mean $`(\underset{}{t})_\pm `$ and $`(\underset{}{t_\pm }).`$

g6 The skew-symmetric part of the generalized of $`t`$ can be factorized by the noticeable formula444Recall that $`X\times Y\frac{1}{2}(XYYX).`$

$$\underset{}{t}_{}(X)=\frac{1}{2}biv[t]\times X,$$
(59)
where $`biv[t]t(e^k)e_k`$ is an *characteristic invariant* of $`t,`$ the so-called *bivector of* $`t.`$

###### Proof.

By using eq.(58), the well-known identity $`t_{}(a)=\frac{1}{2}biv[t]\times a`$ and the remarkable multivector identity $`B\times X=(B\times e^k)(e_k\mathrm{}X),`$ with $`B^2V`$ and $`XV,`$ we have that

$$\underset{}{t}_{}(X)=t_{}(e^k)(e_k\mathrm{}X)=(\frac{1}{2}biv[t]\times e^k)(e_k\mathrm{}X)=\frac{1}{2}biv[t]\times X.$$

g7 A noticeable formula holds for the skew-symmetric part of the generalized of $`t.`$ For all $`X,YV`$

$$\underset{}{t}_{}(XY)=\underset{}{t}_{}(X)Y+X\underset{}{t}_{}(Y),$$
(60)
where $``$ is any product either $`(),`$ $`(),`$ $`(\mathrm{},\mathrm{})`$ or $`(`$*Clifford product*$`).`$

In order to prove this property we should use eq.(59) and the noticeable multivector identity $`B\times (XY)=(B\times X)Y+X(B\times Y),`$ with $`B^2V`$ and $`X,YV.`$ By taking into account eq.(54) we can see that the following property for the euclidean scalar product of multivectors holds

$$\underset{}{t}_{}(X)Y+X\underset{}{t}_{}(Y)=0.$$
(61)
It is consistent with the well-known property: *the adjoint of a skew-symmetric extensor equals minus the extensor!*

## 7 Determinant

We now define a characteristic scalar associated to any $`(1,1)`$-extensor $`t.`$ It is the unique real number, denoted by $`det[t],`$ such that

$$\underset{¯}{t}(I)=det[t]I,$$
(62)
for all non-zero pseudoscalar $`I.`$ It will be called the *determinant of* $`t.`$

It is a well-definedscalar invariant since it does not depend on the choice of $`I.`$

We present now some of the most important properties satisfied by the determinant.

d1 Let $`t`$ and $`u`$ be two $`(1,1)`$–extensors. It holds

$$det[ut]=det[u]det[t].$$
(63)
Take a non-zero pseudoscalar $`I^nV.`$ Then, by using eq.(35) and eq.(62) we can write that

$`det[ut]I`$ $`=\underset{¯}{ut}(I)=\underset{¯}{u}\underset{¯}{t}(I)=\underset{¯}{u}(\underset{¯}{t}(I))`$
$`=\underset{¯}{u}(det[t]I)=det[t]\underset{¯}{u}(I),`$
$`=det[t]det[u]I.`$
d2 Let us take $`text_1^1(V)`$ with inverse $`t^1ext_1^1(V).`$ It holds

$$det[t^1]=(det[t])^1.$$
(64)
Indeed, by using eq.(63) and the obvious property $`det[i_V]=1,`$ we have that

$$t^1t=tt^1=i_Vdet[t^1]det[t]=det[t]det[t^1]=1.$$

It means that the *determinant of the inverse equals the inverse of the determinant.*

Due to the above corollary it is often convenient to use the short notation $`det^1[t]`$ for both of $`det[t^1]`$ and $`(det[t])^1.`$

d3 Let us take $`text_1^1(V).`$ It holds

$$det[t^{}]=det[t].$$
(65)
Indeed, take a non-zero $`I^nV.`$ Then, by using eq.(62), eq.(43) and eq.(46), we have that

$$det[t^{}]II=\underset{¯}{t}^{}(I)I=I\underset{¯}{t}(I)=Idet[t]I=det[t]II,$$

from where the expected result follows.

Let $`\{e_j\}`$ be any basis for $`V,`$ and $`\{e^j\}`$ be its euclidean reciprocal basis for $`V,`$ i.e., $`e_je^k=\delta _j^k.`$ There are two interesting and useful formulas for calculating $`det[t],`$ i.e.,

$`det[t]`$ $`=\underset{¯}{t}(e_1\mathrm{}e_n)(e^1\mathrm{}e^n),`$ (66)
$`=\underset{¯}{t}(e^1\mathrm{}e^n)(e_1\mathrm{}e_n).`$ (67)
They follow from eq.(62) by using $`(e_1\mathrm{}e_n)(e^1\mathrm{}e^n)=1`$ which is an immediate consequence of the formula for the euclidean scalar product of simple $`k`$-vectors and the reciprocity property of $`\{e_k\}`$ and $`\{e^k\}`$.

Each of eq.(66) and eq.(67) is completely equivalent to the definition of determinant given by eq.(62).

## 8 Some Applications

###### Theorem 1.

Let $`(\{b_k\},\{b^k\})`$ and $`(\{e_k\},\{e^k\})`$ be two pairs of euclidean bases for $`V.`$ There exists an unique invertible $`(1,1)`$-extensor $`f`$ such that

$`e_k`$ $`=f(b_k),`$ (68)
$`e^k`$ $`=f^{}(b^k)\text{ for each }k=1,\mathrm{},n.`$ (69)
And, reciprocally given an arbitrary invertible $`(1,1)`$-extensor, say $`f`$, it is possible construct from a pair of reciprocal bases, say $`(\{b_k\},\{b^k\}),`$ with the above formulas another pair of reciprocal bases, say $`(\{e_k\},\{e^k\}).`$

###### Proof.

Since each one of the sets $`\{e_k\}`$ and $`\{e^k\}`$ is a basis of $`V,`$ there must be exactly two invertible $`(1,1)`$-extensors over $`V,`$ say $`f_1`$ and $`f_2,`$ such that

$`e_k`$ $`=f_1(b_k),`$
$`e^k`$ $`=f_2(b^k)\text{ for each }k=1,\mathrm{},n.`$
It is not difficult to see that $`f_1`$ and $`f_2`$ are given by

$`f_1(v)`$ $`=\underset{j=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}(b_jv)e_j,`$
$`f_2(v)`$ $`=\underset{j=1}{\overset{𝑛}{{\displaystyle }}}(b^jv)e^j.`$
Due to the reciprocity property of $`(\{e_k\},\{e^k\})`$ we have

$$f_1(b_k)f_2(b^l)=\delta _k^lb_kf_1^{}f_2(b^l)=\delta _k^lf_1^{}f_2(b^l)=b^l,$$

for each $`l=1,\mathrm{},n.`$ Thus, $`f_1^{}f_2=i_V.`$ Now, let us choose $`f_1=f.`$ Then, it must be $`f_2=f^{}`$ (recall that $`f^{}=(f^{})^1=(f^1)^{}`$), and so the first statement follows. To prove the second statement we must check that $`\{e_k\}`$ and $`\{e^k\}`$ given by eqs.(68) and (69) satisfy the reciprocity property. Indeed, by using eq.(43), we can write

$$e_ke^l=f(b_k)f^{}(b^l)=b_kf^{}f^{}(b^l)=b_kb^l=\delta _k^l.$$

### 8.1 Orthonormal Bases

It should be noted that if $`f`$ is an *orthogonal* $`(1,1)`$-*extensor* (i.e., $`f^{}=f^1,`$ or equivalently $`f=f^{}`$ (the adjoint of $`f`$ being taken with respect to the euclidean scalar product), then $`\{e_k\}`$, as defined in eq.(68), is an *orthonormal basis* for $`V,`$ i.e., $`e_je_k=\delta _{jk}`$, if and only if $`\{b_k\}`$ is an *orthonormal basis* for $`V,`$ i.e., $`b_jb_k=\delta _{jk}.`$ Indeed, $`e_je_k=f(b_j)f(b_k)=f^{}f(b_j)b_k=b_jb_k=\delta _{jk}`$.

### 8.2 Changing Basis Extensor

Theorem 1 implies that for two arbitrary pairs of reciprocal bases of $`V,`$ say $`(\{e_k\},\{e^k\})`$ and $`(\{e_k^{}\},\{e^k\})`$, there must be an unique invertible $`(1,1)`$-extensor over $`V,`$ say $`\epsilon ,`$ such that

$`\epsilon (e_k)`$ $`=e_k^{},`$ (70)
$`\epsilon ^{}(e^k)`$ $`=e^k.`$ (71)
Indeed, there are exactly two invertible $`(1,1)`$-extensors, say $`f`$ and $`f^{},`$ such that $`e_k=f(b_k),`$ $`e^k=f^{}(b^k)`$ and $`e_k^{}=f^{}(b_k),`$ $`e^k=f^{}(b^k)`$ for each $`k=1,\mathrm{},n.`$ From these equations we get $`e_k^{}=f^{}f^1(e_k)`$ and $`e^k=f^{}f^{}(e^k)`$. It means that there is an unique invertible $`(1,1)`$-extensor which satisfies eqs.(70) and (71). Such one is given by $`\epsilon =f^{}f^1.`$

Such $`\epsilon ext_1^1(V)`$ will be called the *changing basis extensor relative to* $`(\{e_k\},\{e^k\})`$ *and* $`(\{e_k^{}\},\{e^k\})`$ (in this order!).

The changing basis extensor $`\epsilon ,`$ as is not difficult to see, can be defined equivalently by

$$\epsilon (v)=(e^sv)e_s^{}.$$
(72)
Also, we can easily see that $`\epsilon ^1,`$ can be alternatively defined by

$$\epsilon ^1(v)=(e^sv)e_s,$$
(73)
and, by using eq.(43), a straightforward calculation yields

$`\epsilon ^{}(v)`$ $`=(e_s^{}v)e^s,`$ (74)
$`\epsilon ^{}(v)`$ $`=(e_sv)e^s.`$ (75)
As we know, the vector bases $`\{e_k\}`$ and $`\{e_k^{}\}`$ induce the $`k`$-vector bases $`\{e_{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_k}\}`$ and $`\{e_{j_1}^{}\mathrm{}e_{j_k}^{}\}`$. From eq.(70) by using eq.(33) it follows that

$$\underset{¯}{\epsilon }(e_{j_1}\mathrm{}e_{j_k})=e_{j_1}^{}\mathrm{}e_{j_k}^{}.$$
(76)
Analogously for the vector bases $`\{e^j\}`$ and $`\{e^j\}`$ it holds

$$\underset{¯}{\epsilon }^{}(e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_k})=e^{j_1}\mathrm{}e^{j_k}.$$
(77)
### 8.3 Inversion of a Non-singular $`(1,1)`$-Extensor

We will end this section presenting an useful formula for the inversion of a non-singular $`(1,1)`$–extensor.

Let us take $`text_1^1(V)`$. If $`t`$ is non-singular, i.e., $`det[t]0,`$ then there exists its inverse $`t^1ext_1^1(V)`$ which is given by

$$t^1(v)=\stackrel{1}{det}[t]\underset{¯}{t}^{}(vI)I^1,$$
(78)
where $`I^nV`$ is any non-zero pseudoscalar.

###### Proof.

We must prove that $`t^1`$ given by the formula above satisfies both of conditions $`t^1t=i_V`$ and $`tt^1=i_V.`$ Let $`I^nV`$ be a non-zero pseudoscalar. Take $`vV,`$ by using the extensor identities555These extensor identities follow directly from the fundamental identity $`X\mathrm{}\underset{¯}{t}(Y)=\underset{¯}{t}(\underset{¯}{t}^{}(X)\mathrm{}Y)`$ with $`X,YV`$. For the first one: take $`X=v,`$ $`Y=I`$ and use $`(t^{})^{}=t,`$ eq.(62) and $`det[t^{}]=det[t].`$ For the second one: take $`X=vI,Y=I^1`$ and use eq.(62). $`\underset{¯}{t}^{}(t(v)I)I^1=t(\underset{¯}{t}^{}(vI)I^1)=det[t]v,`$ we have that

$$t^1t(v)=t^1(t(v))=\stackrel{1}{det}[t]\underset{¯}{t}^{}(t(v)I)I^1=\stackrel{1}{det}[t]det[t]v=i_V(v).$$

And

$$tt^1(v)=t(t^1(v))=\stackrel{1}{det}[t]t(\underset{¯}{t}^{}(vI)I^1)=\stackrel{1}{det}[t]det[t]v=i_V(v).$$

## 9 Conclusions

We introduced and developed some aspects of the theory of extensors, and made preliminary applications of it. The concept of extensor when used together with the euclidean Clifford algebra (as introduced in , paper I of this series) permits an intrinsic formulation of the key concepts of linear algebra theory, and plays a crucial role in our study of more sophisticated concepts which are developed in subsequent papers of the present series. And also in some forthcoming new series of papers.

Acknowledgement: V. V. Fernández is grateful to FAPESP for a posdoctoral fellowship. W. A. Rodrigues Jr. is grateful to CNPq for a senior research fellowship (contract 201560/82-8) and to the Department of Mathematics of the University of Liverpool for the hospitality. Authors are also grateful to Drs. P. Lounesto, I. Porteous, and J. Vaz Jr. for their interest on our research and for useful suggestions and discussions.

## 10 References