Reflexive space

A Banach space that coincides under the canonical imbedding with its second dual (cf. Adjoint space). More precisely, let be the space dual to , i.e. the set of all continuous linear functionals defined on . If is the value of the functional on an element , then with a fixed and running through , the formula defines a linear functional on , that is, an element of the space . Let be the set of such functionals. The correspondence is an isomorphism which does not change the norm: . If , then the space is called reflexive. The spaces and , , are reflexive, and the space is not reflexive.

A space is reflexive if and only if the space is reflexive. Another criteria of reflexivity of a Banach space is weak compactness (cf. Weak topology) of the unit ball of this space.

A reflexive space is weakly complete and a closed subspace of a reflexive space is reflexive.

The concept of reflexivity naturally extends to locally convex spaces (cf. Locally convex space).

References

[1]	N. Dunford, J.T. Schwartz, "Linear operators. General theory" , 1 , Interscience (1958)
[2]	K. Yosida, "Functional analysis" , Springer (1980) pp. Chapt. 8, §1
[3]	L.V. Kantorovich, G.P. Akilov, "Functional analysis" , Pergamon (1982) (Translated from Russian)

References

[a1]	B. Beauzamy, "Introduction to Banach spaces and their geometry" , North-Holland (1982)
[a2]	M.M. Day, "Normed linear spaces" , Springer (1973)
[a3]	D. van Dulst, "Reflexive and superreflexive Banach spaces" , MC Tracts , 102 , Math. Centre (1978)