Compatibility of tensor product with subspace structure

linear algebratensor-products

Suppose that $W$ (resp. $W'$) is a subspace of the vector space $V$ (resp. $V'$).

My question is : how can we see the tensor product of $W$ and $W'$ (seen as vector spaces) as a subspace of $V\otimes V'$ ? More precisely :

As vector spaces themselves, we can define the tensor product $W\otimes' W'$ as the quotient
of the free vector space over $W\times W'$ by the space generated by the terms of the type $\lambda (v,w) – (\lambda v,w)$, $(v+v',w)-(v,w)-(v',w)$, $\lambda(v,w)-(v,\lambda w)$, and $(v,w+w')-(v,w)-(v,w')$, where $v,v'\in W$, $w,w'\in W'$ and $\lambda\in \mathbb{K}$.

I used the notation $\otimes'$ for the tensor product on $W\times W'$ ($W$ and $W'$ seen as vector spaces), to distinguish with the tensor product on $V\times V'$ (denoted $\otimes$).

There is a natural linear map $f:W\otimes' W'\to V\otimes V'$ such that $f(w\otimes' w')= w\otimes w'$. The question is : is that map $f$ injective ?
It seems to me that the answer is yes, but I haven't been able to find a precise reference of that fact.

Best Answer

Hint: tensor products over vector spaces are convenient enough, in the sense that if $V$ and $V'$ have basis $B$ and $B'$, then $\{v \otimes v' : v \in B, v' \in B'\}$ is a basis for $V \otimes V'$.

Proof sketch: since tensor products commute with direct sums, we have

$$ V \otimes V' = \bigoplus_{v \in B} kv \otimes \bigoplus_{v' \in B'} kv' = \bigoplus_{v\in B, v' \in B'} kv \otimes kv' $$

and $k v \otimes kv' \simeq k \otimes k \simeq k$. Hence $V \otimes V'$ is a sum of copies of $k$. Track each isomorphism to recover the explicit basis in term of elementary tensors. "$\square$"

Now, fix bases of $W$ and $W'$, extend them to $V$ and $V'$, and check what the image of $f$ on a basis of $W \otimes W'$ is.

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