Nonarchimedean Šilov boundaries and multiplicative isometries (Q1384928)

The notion of an extreme point of a convex set plays a key role in the classical theory of Šilov boundaries. For a non-Archimedean valued base field \(K\) however this concept fails and, indeed, examples are given in the paper showing that, unlike the real or complex case, there exist separating subspaces of \(C(X)\) containing the constants, but having no Šilov boundary. To obtain satisfactory results the author introduces a new condition, namely multiplicative closedness as follows. Let \(X\), \(Y\) be locally compact zero-dimensional Hausdorff spaces, let \(C_0(X)\) be the space of all continuous functions \(X\to K\) vanishing at infinity. A set \(A\subset C_0(X)\) is said to be strongly separating if for distinct \(x,y\in X\) there exists an \(f\in A\) with \(| f(x)|\neq | f(y)|\). It is shown that if, in addition, \(A\) is multiplicatively closed, then the Šilov boundary \(\partial_0A\) of \(A\) exists. (\(\Delta\subset X\) is called boundary for \(A\) if for each \(f\in A\) there is an \(x\in\Delta\) with \(\| f\|_\infty= | f(x)|\); a Šilov boundary is a unique minimal closed boundary for \(A\).) Also the following functorial property is shown. Let \(A\subset C_0(X)\), \(B\subset C_0(Y)\) be strongly separating, multiplicatively closed. If \(T: A\to B\) is a multiplicative isometrical bijection then there exists a homeomorphism \(h:\partial_0B\to\partial_0A\) such that \(| Tf(y)|= | f(h(y))|\) for all \(f\in A\) and all \(y\in\partial_0B\). There are several additional results and examples to illustrate the theory.