MT1223: Linear Algebra
This is the coursepage for the linear algebra course for January 2026 at IISER, Pune. I will be teaching this course till the mid-semester exam. Professor Vivek Mohan Mallick will teach this course after mid-semester examiation.
The main topics in this course are matrix theory and system of linear equations. The focus will be divided equally between the computational aspects and rigorous proofs. This is a compulsory course for first-year BS-MS students.
Homework
Weekly homework assignments will be uploaded on the Google Classroom page for this course by Saturday evening. These do not need to be submitted and will not be graded. Please join google classroom using
https://classroom.google.com/c/ODIxNzEzNjA3MjMz?cjc=trmmeagn
Tests
A short test will be taken at the beginning of each tutorial session (20 minutes) based on the homework assignment of the previous week. We will consider best of 8 out of 10.
Exams
There will be one mid-semester exam and one final exam.
Grading
The final score is calculated as follows:
Weekly tests (40%)
Mid-semester exam (30%)
End-semester exam (30%)
The two lowest weekly-test scores will be dropped before calculation, but no further relaxations will be made for sickness, emergencies, institute events etc. No email will be answered regarding this.
Remedial classes for students who did not take mathematics in school:-
Our teaching assistant Aakash Gupta has kindly agreed to take remedial classes every saturday 11 am at Madhava Hall for students who did not take mathematics in school. All the others are welcome to join.
Announcements:
First class will be on 7/1/26. First tutorial will be on 12/1/26. First quiz will be on 19/1/26.
There will be total 10 quizzes as part of part of continuous assessment. Four of the them will be before mid-semester exam. Six of them will be after mid-semester examination.
We will conduct Quiz 1 on January 19. The questions will be based on Assignment 1.
We will conduct Quiz 2 on February 2. The questions will be based on Assignment 2.
We will conduct Quiz 3 on February 9. The questions will be based on Assignment 3.
We will conduct Quiz 4 on February 16. The questions will be based on Assignment4.
Pre-requisites
None
Lectures
Wednesdays and Fridays: 8:45-9:45am in NLH
Tutorials
The class will be divided into eight groups. These groups will have tutorials at one of two possible slots in LHC 105, 106, 107, 108:
Monday 10-11:30am (Groups T7, T8, T9, T10)
Monday 5-6:30pm (Groups T1,T2,T3,T4,T5,T6)
Changing tutorial groups is not permitted.
Instructors
(First Half) Debargha Banerjee, Email: debargha@iiserpune.ac.in
(Second Half) Vivek Mohan Mallick, Email: vmallick@iiserpune.ac.in
Teaching Assistants
Aakash Gupta, Email: aakash.gupta@students.iiserpune.ac.in
Priya Singh, Email: singh.priya@students.iiserpune.ac.in
Subham Samal, Email: subham.samal@students.iiserpune.ac.in
Mehul Maurya, Email: mehul.maurya@students.iiserpune.ac.in
Nishtha Sharma, Email: nish1001sharma@gmail.com
Gaurav Kumar, Email:gaurav.kumar@students.iiserpune.ac.in
Mohammed Sharukh, Email: mohd.sharukh@acads.iiserpune.ac.in
Prashant Arote, Email: prashant.arote@acads.iiserpune.ac.in
Textbooks:
2. Introduction to Linear Algebra: G. Strang (2009), Wellesley Cambridge Press
3. Linear Algebra done right: S. Axler (2014) Springer
4. Linear Algebra with applications: Bretscher (2012), Pearson
5. Linear Algebra: K. Hoffman and R. Kunze (2009), Prentice Hall
6. Linear Algebra: A Geometric Approach by S. Kumaresan
Week 1: Jan 7, Overview of the course, vector spaces in R^n
Jan 9: Matrix operations
Week 2: 14 (Makar Sankranti), Holiday
Jan 16:, Systems of linear equations
Week 3:
Jan 21, 23: Gauss-Jordan elimination
Week 4: Jan 28, 30: Matrix inversion; determinants
Week 1: 4, 6 Abstract vector spaces; examples; subspaces
Week 2: 11, 12: linear combination of vectors
Week 3: 18: Revision