Characterizations of certain means of positive operators (Q2418956)

The paper under review studies two particular classes of operator means and their specific properties. In fact, the author provides some remarkable characterizations of quasi-arithmetic operator means and Kubo-Ando means. If \(B(H)^{++}\) denotes the cone of positive definite operators in the algebra of bounded linear operators defined on a complex Hilbert space \(H\), then the quasi-arithmetic operator mean corresponding to a continuous strictly monotone function \(\varphi\colon (0,\infty)\to\mathbb{R}\) is given by \[ M_\varphi(A,B)=\varphi^{-1}\left(\frac{\varphi(A)+\varphi(B)}2\right)\quad (A,B\in B(H)^{++}). \] Regarding quasi-arithmetic operator means, one result of the paper is that these means can be characterized by the following three natural properties: \begin{align*} M(A,A)=A, \quad M(A,B)=M(B,A),\\ \varphi(A)\leq \varphi(A')\iff\varphi(M(A,B))\leq\varphi(M(A',B)) \end{align*} for any \(A,A', B\in B(H)^{++}\). In the class of Kubo-Ando means, the author establishes some characterizations of the geometric, arithmetic and harmonic means. The author obtains that if on a non-comutative \(C^*\)-algebra there is no other Kubo-Ando mean \(\tau\) different from \(\sigma\) of the form \[ A\tau B=\varphi^{-1}(\varphi(A)\sigma\varphi(B)), \] then \(\sigma\) is the geometric mean. This condition can be used to characterize commutativity of \(C^*\)-algebras. For the arithmetic and harmonic means, two characterizations are given. In particular, when \(\sigma\) is a symmetric Kubo-Ando mean then \(\sigma\) is either the arithmetic mean or the harmonic mean if and only if either of the following two properties holds: (1) there exists a continuous strictly increasing surjective function \(g\colon (0,\infty)\to(0,\infty)\) such that the operation \[ (A,B)\mapsto g(A\sigma B)\quad (A,B\in B(H)^{++}) \] is associative; (2) for any \(A,B\in B(H)^{++}\): \[ (A\sigma A)\sigma (I\sigma B)=(A\sigma I)\sigma (A\sigma B) \] where \(I\) is the identity.