Polynomial matrices with given determinant (Q2639131)

Let R be a commutative ring with unity. The following elementary theorem is proved: if \(f\in a_ 1R+...+a_ nR\) has the form \(f=a_ 1f_ 1+...+a_ nf_ n\) and \(f_ 1,...,f_ n\) are relatively prime (i.e. \(f_ 1R+...+f_ nR=R\)), then there exists an \(n\times n\) matrix M with elements in R having \((a_ 1,...,a_ n)\) as its first row and such that \(\det M=f\). It extends the well-known fact for the integers. Applications to polynomial matrices are given.