An extremal property of Hermite polynomials

Let H_n be the nth Hermite polynomial, i.e., the nth orthogonal on polynomial with respect to the weight w(x)=exp(−x²). We prove the following: If f is an arbitrary polynomial of degree at most n, such that |f||H_n| at the zeros of H_n+1, then for k=1,…,n we have f^(k)H_n^(k), where · is the norm. This result can be viewed as an inequality of the Duffin and Schaeffer type. As corollaries, we obtain a Markov-type inequality in the norm, and estimates for the expansion coefficients in the basis of Hermite polynomials.