Subspaces of \(L(H)\) that are *-invariant (Q1849068)

A complex vector space \(X\), equipped with a conjugate linear automorphism \(X\mapsto X^*\) of order two is said to be matrix-ordered if, for each positive integer \(n\), there exists a subset \(M_n(X)_+\) of the space \(M_n(X)_{sa}\) of \(n\times n\) matrices \((X_{jk})\) over \(X\) which have the property that \[ (X^*_{jk})= (X_{kj}), \] such that (i) \(M_n(X)_+\cap -M_n(X)_+= \{(0)\}\); (ii) for all \(m\) and \(n\), \(M_n(X)_+\oplus M_m(X)_+ \subseteq M_{m+n} (X)_+\); (iii) for all \(m\) and \(n\), and for all \(m\times n\) complex matrices \(\gamma\), \(\gamma^*M_m(X)_+ \gamma\subseteq M_n(X)_+\). Such a space is said to be a unital operator system if \(X_{sa}\) has an order unit and each of the cones \(M_n(X)_+\) is Archimedean. A classical result of Choi and Effros shows that for every such system there exists a complex Hilbert space \(H\) and a self-adjoint subspace \(Y\) of the \(W^*\)-algebra \(B(H)\) of bounded linear operators on \(H\), containing the unit \(1_H\) of \(B(H)\) and a completely positive unital isomorphism from \(X\) onto \(Y\). This paper is concerned with the non-unital version of this result. A matrix ordered complex vector space \(X\) is said to be a matrix-ordered operator space if, for each \(n\), there exists a norm \(|\cdot|\) on \(M_n(X)\) such that (i) for all \(m\times n\) complex matrices \(\alpha\) and \(\beta\), and for all \(A\) in \(M_n(X)\), \[ |\alpha A\beta^*|_m\leq |\alpha||A|_n|\beta^*|; \] (ii) for \(A\) in \(M_m(X)\) and \(B\) in \(M_n(X)\), \(|A\oplus B|_{m+n}= \max\{|A|_m, |B|_n\}\). (iii) the involution on \(M_\infty(X)\) is isometric; (iv) the cones \(M_n(X)_+\) are closed. Let \(X\) be such a space, let \(A\) lie in \(M_n(X)\) and let \[ \nu_n(A)= \sup\biggl\{\bigl|\varphi(A)\bigr|: \varphi\in S_n(X) \biggr\}, \] where \(S_n(X)\) is the state space of \(M_n(X)\). Then the numerical radius \(\nu_n\) has a natural extension to a norm \(\nu\) on \(M_\infty(X)\). The space \(X\) is said to be an operator system if the norms \(|\cdot|_\infty\) and \(\nu\) are equivalent. The paper describes how a matrix-ordered operator space \(X\) can be embedded into a similar object which has an order unit, and shows in particular that the embedding is canonical if and only if \(X\) is an operator system, and if and only if there exists a complex Hilbert space \(H\) and a complete order isomorphism from \(H\) onto a self-adjoint subspace of \(B(H)\).