Geometry of unitary orbits of pinching operators (Q1947266)

To describe the contents of the paper under review, let \({\mathcal I}\) be any symmetrically-normed ideal in \({\mathcal B}({\mathcal H})\) for some complex separable Hilbert space \({\mathcal H}\). Let \({\mathcal U}_{\mathcal I}\) denote the group of unitary operators in \(1+{\mathcal I}\) and define \(L_u:{\mathcal I}\to{\mathcal I}\), \(L_ux=ux\), for all \(x\in{\mathcal I}\). Then \({\mathcal U}_{\mathcal I}\) acts on the bounded linear operators on \({\mathcal I}\) by \({\mathcal U}_{\mathcal I}\times{\mathcal B}({\mathcal I})\to{\mathcal B}({\mathcal I})\), \((u,T)\mapsto L_uTL_{u^*}\), and it is natural to try to understand the differential geometric properties of the orbits of that group action, since \({\mathcal U}_{\mathcal I}\) is itself a Banach-Lie group. The aim of the paper under review is precisely to address that problem for the \({\mathcal U}_{\mathcal I}\)-orbits of the so-called pinching operators on \({\mathcal I}\), which are the operators of the form \(x\mapsto \sum_{1\leq j< w}p_jxp_j\), where \(\{p_j\}_{1\leq j<w}\) is any finite or infinite family of mutually orthogonal projections which may not sum up to \(1\). Besides turning the \({\mathcal U}_{\mathcal I}\)-orbit of a pinching operator into a smooth manifold, the authors also investigate the cases when that manifold is actually a submanifold of \({\mathcal B}({\mathcal I})\) and they exhibit a covering space property of that orbit. The case when \({\mathcal I}\) is the ideal of all compact operators is carefully discussed.