The iterated Aluthge transform of an operator (Q1811175)

Let \(T=U|T|\) be the polar decomposition of a bounded linear operator \(T\) on a separable complex Hilbert space \(\mathcal{H}\). The Aluthge transform of \(T\) is defined by \(\widetilde{T}=|T|^{\frac{1}{2}}U|T|^{\frac{1}{2}}\), and \(\widetilde{T}^{(n)}\) denotes the iterated Aluthge transform of \(T\): \[ \widetilde{T}^{(0)}=T, \quad \widetilde{T}^{(n)}= \widetilde{\left(\widetilde{T}^{(n-1)}\right)}. \] Let \(\mathcal{N}(T)\) be the set of all normal operators with the same spectrum of \(T\). In the present paper, the authors discuss whether the sequence \(\{\widetilde{T}^{(n)}\}_{n=1}^{\infty}\) converges or not. In the case that the space \(\mathcal{H}\) is finite dimensional, the authors obtain the following result: Let \(T\) be an operator on a finite dimensional Hilbert space. Then the sequence \(\{\widetilde{T}^{(n)}\}_{n=1}^{\infty}\) satisfies \[ \lim_{n\to\infty} \roman{dist}(\widetilde{T}^{(n)}, \;\mathcal{N}(T))=0, \] where the above distance is calculated using either \(\|\;\|\) or \(\|\;\|_{2}\). In the case when the space \(\mathcal{H}\) is infinite dimensional, the authors obtain a concrete form of the iterated Aluthge transform of weighted shifts.