The problem is formulated as follows:
Given $0\neq x \in \mathbb{R}^n$, and $k\leq n$, consider the following optimization problem $$\min_{\textrm{rank}(C)=k}x^t(I_n-C)^t(I_n-C)x$$ where $I_n$ be the unit matrix of $\mathbb{R}^{n\times n}$ and the minimum is taken over all $C \in \mathbb{R}^{n\times n}$ with rank of $k$.
I think this should be a standard problem, but I am not sure how to proceed with this. Any comment will be greatly appreciated!
:)– Dan Oct 05 '13 at 01:40