Dimension of faces generated by certain positive linear operators (Q1111649)

Let \(K_ 1\) and \(K_ 2\) be proper cones in \({\mathbb{R}}^ n\) and \({\mathbb{R}}^ m\), respectively, and let \(\Pi (K_ 1,K_ 2)\) denote the cone of all linear transformations A from \({\mathbb{R}}^ n\) to \({\mathbb{R}}^ m\) such that \(AK_ 1\subset K_ 2\). For a cone K and \(x\in K\), let \(\Phi\) (x) denote the face generated by x, and let Ext K be the set consisting of 0 and the extremals of K (i.e., those \(x\in K\) such that \(\Phi\) (x) is an extreme ray.) In this article the author considers the problem of an upper bound for dim \(\Phi\) (A), where \(A\in \Pi (K_ 1,K_ 2)\), rank A\(=r\), AExt \(K_ 1\subset Ext K_ 2\), and \(K_ 1\) and \(K_ 2\) are indecomposable proper cones. It is proved that: if in addition one of the conditions: a) \(K_ 1\) has \(n+1\) or \(n+2\) extreme rays, b) Any n-dimensional (r- dimensional) cone generated by \(n+2(r+2)\) extreme rays of \(K_ 1(AK_ 1)\) is indecomposable holds, then \(\dim \Phi (A)\leq n+1-r.\) Finally it is shown, by an example, that \(\dim \Phi (A)\leq n+1-r\) is not generally true.