Tychonoff’s theorem
Let be a family of nonempty topological spaces![]()
. The product space (see product topology)
is compact if and only if each of the spaces is compact.
Not surprisingly, if is infinite![]()
, the proof requires the Axiom of Choice
![]()
. Conversely, one can show that Tychonoff
’s theorem implies that any product
of nonempty sets is nonempty, which is one form of the Axiom of Choice.