Majorizing measures and proportional subsets of bounded orthonormal systems (Q1001603)

The authors prove that, for any \(1<k<n\) and any orthonormal system \(\{f_i\} _{i\leq n}\) in \(L_2\) which is bounded in \(L_{\infty}\) by \(M>0\), there exists a subset \(I\) of \(\{1, 2, \dots, n\}\) with cardinality at least \(n-k\) such that, on the span of \(\{f_i\} _{i\in I}\), the \(L_1\) and \(L_2\) norms are equivalent up to a factor \(C \mu (\ln mu) ^{5/2}\), where \(\mu=M\sqrt{n/k} \sqrt{\ln k}\) and \(C\) is an absolute constant. In particular, it implies Kashin's splitting of a set of orthonormal vectors, bounded in \(L_{\infty}\) metric. The results improve those obtained in [\textit{O.~Guédon, S.~Mendelson, A.~Pajor} and \textit{N.~Tomczak-Jaegermann}, Positivity 11, 269--283 (2007; Zbl 1126.46007)]. The proofs are based on the majorizing measures technique and new observations on covering and packing numbers. In the appendix, the optimality of the results is discussed.