It has been shown that the Majumdar–Ghosh model has two minimum energy states, or ground states, namely the states in which neighboring pairs of spins form singlet configurations. The wavefunction for each ground state is a product of these singlet pairs. This explains why there must be at least two ground states with the same energy, since one may be obtained from the other by merely shifting, or translating, the system by one lattice spacing. Furthermore, it has been shown that these (and linear combinations of them) are the unique ground states.