Smoothness of bounded linear operators

Kallol Paul, Debmalya Sain, Puja Ghosh

Published 2015-03-12Version 1

We prove that for a bounded linear operator $T$ on a Hilbert space $\mathbb{H},$ $T \bot_B A \Leftrightarrow \langle Tx, Ax \rangle = 0 $ for some $x \in S_{\mathbb{H}}, \|Tx\| = \|T\| $ iff the norm attaining set $M_T = \{ x \in S_{\mathbb{H}} : \|Tx\| = \|T\|\} $ is a unit sphere of some finite dimensional subspace $H_0$ of $\mathbb{H}$ i.e., $M_T = S_{H_0} $ and $\|T\|_{{H_0}^{\bot}} < \|T\|.$ We also prove that if $T$ is a bounded linear operator on a Banach space $\mathbb{X}$ with the norm attaining set $M_T = D \cup(-D)$ ( $D$ is a non-empty compact connected subset of $S_{\mathbb{X}}$) and $\sup_{y \in C} \|Ty\| < \|T\|$ for all closed subsets $C$ of $S_{\mathbb{X}}$ with $d(M_T,C) > 0,$ then $T \bot_B A \Leftrightarrow Tx \bot_B Ax $ for some $x \in M_T.$ Using these results we characterize smoothness of compact operators on normed linear spaces and smoothness of bounded linear operators on Hilbert as well as Banach spaces. This is for the first time that a characterization of smoothness of bounded linear operators on a normed linear space has been obtained. We prove that $T \in B(\mathbb{X}, \mathbb{Y})$ (where $\mathbb{X}$ is a real Banach space and $\mathbb{Y}$ is a real normed linear space) is smooth iff $T$ attains its norm at unique (upto muliplication by scalar) vector $ x \in S_{\mathbb{X}},$ $Tx$ is a smooth point of $\mathbb{Y} $ and $\sup_{y \in C} \|Ty\| < \|T\|$ for all closed subsets $C$ of $S_{\mathbb{X}}$ with $d(\pm x,C) > 0.$