Orthonormal basis


In mathematics, particularly linear algebra, an orthonormal basis for an inner product space V with finite dimension is a basis for V whose vectors are orthonormal, that is, they are all unit vectors and orthogonal to each other. For example, the standard basis for a Euclidean space Rn is an orthonormal basis, where the relevant inner product is the dot product of vectors. The image of the standard basis under a rotation or reflection is also orthonormal, and every orthonormal basis for Rn arises in this fashion.
For a general inner product space V, an orthonormal basis can be used to define normalized orthogonal coordinates on V. Under these coordinates, the inner product becomes a dot product of vectors. Thus the presence of an orthonormal basis reduces the study of a finite-dimensional inner product space to the study of Rn under dot product. Every finite-dimensional inner product space has an orthonormal basis, which may be obtained from an arbitrary basis using the Gram–Schmidt process.
In functional analysis, the concept of an orthonormal basis can be generalized to arbitrary inner product spaces. Given a pre-Hilbert space H, an orthonormal basis for H is an orthonormal set of vectors with the property that every vector in H can be written as an infinite linear combination of the vectors in the basis. In this case, the orthonormal basis is sometimes called a Hilbert basis for H. Note that an orthonormal basis in this sense is not generally a Hamel basis, since infinite linear combinations are required. Specifically, the linear span of the basis must be dense in H, but it may not be the entire space.
If we go on to Hilbert spaces, a non-orthonormal set of vectors having the same linear span as an orthonormal basis may not be a basis at all. For instance, any square-integrable function on the interval can be expressed as an infinite sum of Legendre polynomials, but not necessarily as an infinite sum of the monomials xn.

Examples

If B is an orthogonal basis of H, then every element x of H may be written as
When B is orthonormal, this simplifies to
and the square of the norm of x can be given by
Even if B is uncountable, only countably many terms in this sum will be non-zero, and the expression is therefore well-defined. This sum is also called the Fourier expansion of x, and the formula is usually known as Parseval's identity.
If B is an orthonormal basis of H, then H is isomorphic to ℓ 2 in the following sense: there exists a bijective linear map such that
for all x and y in H.

Incomplete orthogonal sets

Given a Hilbert space H and a set S of mutually orthogonal vectors in H, we can take the smallest closed linear subspace V of H containing S. Then S will be an orthogonal basis of V; which may of course be smaller than H itself, being an incomplete orthogonal set, or be H, when it is a complete orthogonal set.

Existence

Using Zorn's lemma and the Gram–Schmidt process, one can show that every Hilbert space admits a basis, but not orthonormal base; furthermore, any two orthonormal bases of the same space have the same cardinality. A Hilbert space is separable if and only if it admits a countable orthonormal basis..

As a homogeneous space

The set of orthonormal bases for a space is a principal homogeneous space for the orthogonal group O, and is called the Stiefel manifold of orthonormal n-frames.
In other words, the space of orthonormal bases is like the orthogonal group, but without a choice of base point: given an orthogonal space, there is no natural choice of orthonormal basis, but once one is given one, there is a one-to-one correspondence between bases and the orthogonal group.
Concretely, a linear map is determined by where it sends a given basis: just as an invertible map can take any basis to any other basis, an orthogonal map can take any orthogonal basis to any other orthogonal basis.
The other Stiefel manifolds for of incomplete orthonormal bases are still homogeneous spaces for the orthogonal group, but not principal homogeneous spaces: any k-frame can be taken to any other k-frame by an orthogonal map, but this map is not uniquely determined.