Exterior square realization of the orthogonal adjoint representation ($u\wedge v\mapsto (w\mapsto ⟨v,w⟩u-⟨u,w⟩v)$)

For a real inner product space $V$, the displayed map identifies ${\Lambda }^{2}V$ with its Special orthogonal Lie algebra. It sends a wedge of distinct orthonormal basis vectors to the corresponding elementary skew-symmetric matrix, so it is an isomorphism. For an orthogonal transformation $g$, invariance of the inner product gives $\Phi (gu\wedge gv)=g\Phi (u\wedge v)g^{-1}$. Thus the exterior square of the defining representation is the Adjoint representation of the orthogonal group. Complexification identifies their weight spaces, allowing the root system to be read from the exterior-square weights and the zero-weight multiplicity.