Simultaneous congruence of convex compact sets of Hermitian matrices with constant rank

Let S be a compact convex set of n × n hermitian matrices (n ⩾ 2). Suppose every member of S is nonsingular and has exactly one negative eigenvalue. Let (ε₁,…,ε_n) be any ordered n-tuple from the set {- 1, 1}. One of our main results is that a nonsingular matrix X exists such that, for every A in S and every 1 ⩽ j ⩽ n, the (j, j) entry of X¹AX has sign ε_j. A similar result, with only negative ε_j allowed, is proved also for a compact convex set S of n × n hermitian matrices such that every member of S has the same rank and exactly one negative eigenvalue.