Fourier type 2 operators with respect to locally compact abelian groups

A linear and bounded operator T between Banach spaces X and Y has Fourier type 2 with respect to a locally compact abelian group G if there exists a constant c > 0 such that∥T ∥₂ ≤ c∥f∥₂ holds for all X‐valued functions f ∈ L^X₂(G) where is the Fourier transform of f. We show that any Fourier type 2 operator with respect to the classical groups has Fourier type 2 with respect to any locally compact abelian group. This generalizes previous special results for the Cantor group and for closed subgroups of ?ⁿ. (© 2004 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Operators of Fourier type <Emphasis Type="Italic">p</Emphasis> with respect to some subgroups of a locally compact Abelian group

It is shown that all Banach space operators which have Fourier type p(1 < p 2) with respect to a second countable locally compact abelian group G also have Fourier type p with respect to every closed discrete subgroup H of G. The same statement holds for any closed subgroup H of G when p = 2. Also shown as a corollary is that Fourier type 2 operators have Walsh type 2. Received: 10 June 2002     

The Hausdorff dual problem for connected groups

It is shown that a connected locally compact group G has a Hausdorff unitary dual space if and only if G is a compact extension of an abelian group. Applications to group C¹-algebras are given.     

Amenability and weak amenability of the Fourier algebra

Let G be a locally compact group. We show that its Fourier algebra A(G) is amenable if and only if G has an abelian subgroup of finite index, and that its Fourier–Stieltjes algebra B(G) is amenable if and only if G has a compact, abelian subgroup of finite index. We then show that A(G) is weakly amenable if the component of the identity of G is abelian, and we prove some partial results towards the converse.Research supported by NSERC under grant no. 90749-00.Research supported by NSERC under grant no. 227043-00.     

On universal Korovkin sets w.r.t. positive spectral contractions

We prove that there exists a finite universal Korovkin set with respect to positive spectral contraction operators for a Segal algebra on a locally compact abelian groupG if and only ifĜ is finite dimensional separable metrizable space.     

Duality between compactness and discreteness beyond pontryagin duality

One of the most striking results of Pontryagin’s duality theory is the duality between compact and discrete locally compact abelian groups. This duality also persists in part for objects associated with noncommutative topological groups. In particular, it is well known that the dual space of a compact topological group is discrete, while the dual space of a discrete group is quasicompact (i.e., it satisfies the finite covering theorem but is not necessarily Hausdorff). The converse of the former assertion is also true, whereas the converse of the latter is not (there are simple examples of nondiscrete locally compact solvable groups of height 2 whose dual spaces are quasicompact and non-Hausdorff (they are T ₁ spaces)). However, in the class of locally compact groups all of whose irreducible unitary representations are finite-dimensional, a group is discrete if and only if its dual space is quasicompact (and is automatically a T ₁ space). The proof is based on the structural theorem for locally compact groups all of whose irreducible unitary representations are finite-dimensional. Certain duality between compactness and discreteness can also be revealed in groups that are not necessarily locally compact but are unitarily, or at least reflexively, representable, provided that (in the simplest case) the irreducible representations of a group form a sufficiently large family and have jointly bounded dimensions. The corresponding analogs of compactness and discreteness cannot always be easily identified, but they are still duals of each other to some extent.     

Simplicity of Skew Group Rings of Abelian Groups

Necessary and sufficient conditions for simplicity of a general skew group ring A ?_σ G are not known. In this article, we show that a skew group ring A ?_σ G, of an abelian group G, is simple if and only if its centre is a field and A is G-simple. As an application, we show that a transformation group (X, G), where X is a compact Hausdorff space acted upon by an abelian group G, is minimal and faithful if and only if its associated skew group algebra C(X) ?_σ G is simple.     

Qualitative uncertainty principles for groups with finite dimensional irreducible representations

Let G be a locally compact group of type I and its dual space. Roughly speaking, qualitative uncertainty principles state that the concentration of a nonzero integrable function on G and of its operator-valued Fourier transform on is limited. Such principles have been established for locally compact abelian groups and for compact groups. In this paper we prove generalizations to the considerably larger class of groups with finite dimensional irreducible representations.     

Locally minimal topological groups 1

The aim of this paper is to go deeper into the study of local minimality and its connection to some naturally related properties. A Hausdorff topological group (G,τ) is called locally minimal if there exists a neighborhood U of 0 in τ such that U fails to be a neighborhood of zero in any Hausdorff group topology on G which is strictly coarser than τ. Examples of locally minimal groups are all subgroups of Banach-Lie groups, all locally compact groups and all minimal groups. Motivated by the fact that locally compact NSS groups are Lie groups, we study the connection between local minimality and the NSS property, establishing that under certain conditions, locally minimal NSS groups are metrizable. A symmetric subset of an abelian group containing zero is said to be a GTG set if it generates a group topology in an analogous way as convex and symmetric subsets are unit balls for pseudonorms on a vector space. We consider topological groups which have a neighborhood basis at zero consisting of GTG sets. Examples of these locally GTG groups are: locally pseudoconvex spaces, groups uniformly free from small subgroups (UFSS groups) and locally compact abelian groups. The precise relation between these classes of groups is obtained: a topological abelian group is UFSS if and only if it is locally minimal, locally GTG and NSS. We develop a universal construction of GTG sets in arbitrary non-discrete metric abelian groups, that generates a strictly finer non-discrete UFSS topology and we characterize the metrizable abelian groups admitting a strictly finer non-discrete UFSS group topology. Unlike the minimal topologies, the locally minimal ones are always available on “large” groups. To support this line, we prove that a bounded abelian group G admits a non-discrete locally minimal and locally GTG group topology iff |G|?c.     

Extensions of Isometric Dual Representations of Semigroups

Let T be a dual representation of a suitable subsemigroup Sof a locally compact abelian group G by isometries on a dualBanach space X=(X_*)^*. It is shown that (X, T) can be extendedto a dual representation of G on a dual Banach space Y containingX, and that this extension can be done in a canonical way. Inthe case of a representation by *-monomorphisms of a von Neumannalgebra, the extension is a representation of G by *-automorphismsof a von Neumann algebra.     

Quasi‐convexly dense and suitable sets in the arc component of a compact group

Let G be an abelian topological group. The symbol $\widehat{G}Let G be an abelian topological group. The symbol $\widehat{G}$ denotes the group of all continuous characters $\chi :G\rightarrow {\mathbb T}$ endowed with the compact open topology. A subset E of G is said to be qc‐dense in G provided that χ(E)?φ([? 1/4, 1/4]) holds only for the trivial character $\chi \in \widehat{G}$, where $\varphi : {\mathbb R}\rightarrow {\mathbb T}={\mathbb R}/{\mathbb Z}$ is the canonical homomorphism. A super‐sequence is a non‐empty compact Hausdorff space S with at most one non‐isolated point (to which S converges). We prove that an infinite compact abelian group G is connected if and only if its arc component G_a contains a super‐sequence converging to 0 that is qc‐dense in G. This gives as a corollary a recent theorem of Außenhofer: For a connected locally compact abelian group G, the restriction homomorphism $r:\widehat{G}\rightarrow \widehat{G}_a$ defined by $r(\chi )=\chi \upharpoonright _{G_a}$ for $\chi \in \widehat{G}$, is a topological isomorphism. We show that an infinite compact group G is connected if and only if its arc component G_a contains a super‐sequence converging to the identity that is qc‐dense in G and generates a dense subgroup of G. We also offer a short alternative proof of the result of Hofmann and Morris on the existence of suitable sets of minimal size in the arc component of a compact connected group.     

Actions of totally disconnected groups and equivariant singular homology

We study equivariant singular homology in the case of actions of totally disconnected locally compact groups on topological spaces. Theorem A says that if G is a totally disconnected locally compact group and X is a G-space, then any short exact sequence of covariant coefficient systems for G induces a long exact sequence of corresponding equivariant singular homology groups of the G-space X. In particular we consider the case where G is a totally disconnected compact group, i.e., a profinite group, and G acts freely on X. Of special interest is the case where G is a p-adic group, p a prime. The conjecture that no p-adic group, p a prime, can act effectively on a connected topological manifold, is namely known to be equivalent to the famous Hilbert-Smith conjecture. The Hilbert-Smith conjecture is the statement that, if a locally compact group G acts effectively on a connected topological manifold M, then G is a Lie group.     

Symplectic structures on locally compact abelian groups and polarizations

LetX be a locally compact abelian group and ω(.,.) a symplectic structure on it. A polarization for (X, ω) is a pair of totally isotropic closed subgroupsG, G* ofX such thatX =G.G* and ω(.,.) defines a dual pairing ofG andG*. In this paper we describe a class of such groups which always admit a polarization and also discuss their structure. Dedicated to the memory of Professor K G Ramanathan     

Geometry of spaces of compact operators

We introduce the notion of compactly locally reflexive Banach spaces and show that a Banach space X is compactly locally reflexive if and only if for all reflexive Banach spaces Y. We show that X ^* has the approximation property if and only if X has the approximation property and is compactly locally reflexive. The weak metric approximation property was recently introduced by Lima and Oja. We study two natural weak compact versions of this property. If X is compactly locally reflexive then these two properties coincide. We also show how these properties are related to the compact approximation property and the compact approximation property with conjugate operators for dual spaces.     

Harmonic Functions on Homogeneous Spaces

 Given a locally compact group G acting on a locally compact space X and a probability measure σ on G, a real Borel function f on X is called σ-harmonic if it satisfies the convolution equation . We give conditions for the absence of nonconstant bounded harmonic functions. We show that, if G is a union of σ-admissible neighbourhoods of the identity, relative to X, then every bounded σ-harmonic function on X is constant. Consequently, for spread out σ, the bounded σ-harmonic functions are constant on each connected component of a [SIN]-group and, if G acts strictly transitively on a splittable metric space X, then the bounded σ-harmonic functions on X are constant which extends Furstenberg’s result for connected semisimple Lie groups.     

Harmonic Functions on Homogeneous Spaces

 Given a locally compact group G acting on a locally compact space X and a probability measure σ on G, a real Borel function f on X is called σ-harmonic if it satisfies the convolution equation . We give conditions for the absence of nonconstant bounded harmonic functions. We show that, if G is a union of σ-admissible neighbourhoods of the identity, relative to X, then every bounded σ-harmonic function on X is constant. Consequently, for spread out σ, the bounded σ-harmonic functions are constant on each connected component of a [SIN]-group and, if G acts strictly transitively on a splittable metric space X, then the bounded σ-harmonic functions on X are constant which extends Furstenberg’s result for connected semisimple Lie groups. (Received 13 June 1998; in revised form 31 March 1999)     

On pure subgroups of locally compact abelian groups

In this note, we construct an example of a locally compact abelian group G = C × D (where C is a compact group and D is a discrete group) and a closed pure subgroup of G having nonpure annihilator in the Pontrjagin dual $\hat{G}$, answering a question raised by Hartman and Hulanicki. A simple proof of the following result is given: Suppose ${\frak K}$ is a class of locally compact abelian groups such that $G \in {\frak K}$ implies that $\hat{G} \in {\frak K}$ and nG is closed in G for each positive integer n. If H is a closed subgroup of a group $G \in {\frak K}$, then H is topologically pure in G exactly if the annihilator of H is topologically pure in $\hat{G}$. This result extends a theorem of Hartman and Hulanicki.Received: 4 April 2002     

On holomorphic principal bundles over a compact Riemann surface admitting a flat connection

Let G be a connected reductive linear algebraic group over , and X a compact connected Riemann surface. Let be a Levi factor of some parabolic subgroup of G, with its maximal abelian quotient. We prove that a holomorphic G-bundle over X admits a flat connection if and only if for every such L and every reduction of the structure group of to L, the -bundle obtained by extending the structure group of is topologically trivial. For , this is a well-known result of A. Weil. Received: 1 December 2000 / Revised version: 2 April 2001 / Published online: 24 September 2001     

On the Schwartz-Bruhat space and the Paley-Wiener theorem for locally compact abelian groups

Let G be a locally compact abelian group. The Schwartz-Bruhat space of functions on G is then defined in terms of Lie subquotient groups. We give an alternative characterization which involves asymptotic behavior of the function and its Fourier transform, and which makes no reference to Lie theory. We then prove the Paley-Wiener theorem for the Fourier transform of C_C^∞(G). The asymptotic estimates which arise are closely related to those used to characterize the Schwartz-Bruhat space.