Characterization of separating couples

Let A, B be two archimedean ℓ-algebras and let U,V be two positive linear maps from A to B. We call that the couple (U,V) is separating with respect to A and B if |a||b| = 0 in A implies |U (a)||V (b)| = 0 in B. In this paper, we prove that if A is an f-algebra with unit elment e, if B is an ℓ-algebra and if (U,V) is a separating couple with respect to A and B then (U ^∼∼,V ^∼∼), where U ^∼∼ (resp V ^∼∼) is the bi-adjoint of U (resp of V), is again a separating couple with respect to the order continuous order biduals (A′)′ _n and (B′)′ _n of A and B respectively furnished with their Arens products respectively. Moreover, in the case where B′ separates the points of B, we give a characterization of any separating couple with respect to A and B.