Logarithmic Sobolev inequalities on loop groups (Q1180637)

Let \(G\) be a compact connected Lie group. Let \(W_ G\) be the space of paths \([0,1]\buildrel g\over \rightarrow G\) such that \(g(0)=\) identity \(=e\). There is a natural probability measure \(P\) on \(W_ G\) induced by the \(G\)-valued Brownian motion over \([0,1]\) which starts at \(e\). For a point \(x\in G\), the conditional measure \(P(.\mid g(1)=x)=\mu_ x\) is the Brownian measure on the bridge space \(W_ x=\{\gamma \in W_ G: \gamma(1)=x\}\). The purpose of this paper is to prove an inequality for the infinite dimensional loop group \(W_ e\) with respect to the Brownian bridge measure \(\mu_ e\) of the following form, for \(f\) real: \[ \int_{W_ e}f^ 2\log f\mu_ e(d\gamma)\leq \hbox{Const. }\int_{W_ e}\{|\hbox{grad }f(\gamma)|^ 2+V(\gamma)f(\gamma)^ 2\}\mu_ e(d\gamma)+\| f\| ^ 2_{L^ 2(\mu_ e)}\log \| f\|_{L^ 2(\mu_ e)}. \] (Here grad requires a definition.) This is achieved by developing an analogy with the corresponding inequality in finite dimensional manifolds, which is first established. The actual result as stated above relies upon 16 intricate technical lemmas. The final section applies the inequality to certain positivity-preserving hypercontractive semi-groups and their spectra.