A note on ideals of \(C_\infty(X)\) (Q2344324)

Let \(X\) be a completely regular Hausdorff space, \(C_\infty(X)\) the ring of all functions of \(C(X)\) for which \(\{x\in X:|f(x)|\geq\frac{1}{n}\}\) is compact for all \(n\in\mathbb{N}\) and \(\Sigma(X)\) the family of all subrings of \(C(X)\) containing all bounded functions of \(C(X)\). For \(A(X)\in\Sigma(X)\) set \(A_\infty(X)=\{f\in A(X):fg\in C_\infty(X) \;\text{ for all } g\in A(X)\}\). Let \(I\) be a proper ideal of \(C_\infty(X)\) such that \(f\in I\), \(g\in C_\infty(X)\) and \(Z(f):=\{x\in X: f(x)=0\}=Z(g)\) imply \(g\in I\). The main result says that \(I=A_\infty(X)\) for some \(A(X)\in\Sigma(X)\) if and only if \(I\) is ``nicely balanced'', i.e. for all \(f\in C_\infty(X)\setminus I\) there is a \(g\in C(X)\) such that \(gl\in C_\infty(X)\) for all \(l\in I\) but \(fg\notin C_\infty(X)\). Moreover, the article contains several consequences of the main result and various illustrating examples.