Jordan triple endomorphisms and isometries of unitary groups (Q2435554)

Let \(\mathbb{M}_{n}\) be the set of all \(n\times n\) complex matrices and \(\mathbb{U}_{n}\) the group of all unitary elements in \(\mathbb{M}_{n}\). With the first main result of the paper, the author gives the complete description of continuous endomorphisms of \(\mathbb{U}_{n}\) with respect to the Jordan triple product, i.e., continuous maps \(\phi :\) \(\mathbb{U}_{n}\rightarrow \mathbb{U}_{n}\), where \(\phi (VWV)=\phi (V)\phi (W)\phi (V)\) for every \(V,W\in \mathbb{U}_{n}\). As a corollary to this main result, he obtains the following: The map \(\phi :\mathbb{U}_{n}\rightarrow \mathbb{U}_{n}\) is a continuous Jordan triple automorphism, i.e., a bijective map of the above form, if and only if there exist a unitary matrix \(U\in \) \(\mathbb{U}_{n}\) and \(c\in \{-1,1\}\) such that \(\phi \) is one of the following forms: (1) \(\phi (V)=cUVU^{-1}\), \(V\in \mathbb{U}_{n}\), (2) \(\phi (V)=cUV^{-1}U^{-1}\), \(V\in \mathbb{U}_{n}\), (3) \(\phi (V)=cUV^{tr}U^{-1}\), \(V\in \mathbb{U}_{n}\), (4) \(\phi (V)=cU\overline{V}U^{-1}\), \(V\in \mathbb{U}_{n}\). Here, \(A^{tr}\) denotes the transpose and \(\overline{A}\) the complex conjugate of \(A\in \mathbb{M}_{n}\). Recall that a norm \(N(\, .\, )\) on \(\mathbb{M}_{n}\) is called unitarily invariant if \(N(UAV)=N(A)\) holds for all \(A\in \mathbb{M}_{n}\) and \(U,V\in \mathbb{U} _{n}\). As the second main aim of the paper, the author determines the structure of isometries of the unitary group \(\mathbb{U}_{n},\) i.e., maps \(\phi : \mathbb{U}_{n}\rightarrow \mathbb{U}_{n}\) which satisfy \(N(\phi (V)-\phi (W))=N(V-W)\) for all \(V,W\in \mathbb{U}_{n}\), with respect to any unitarily invariant norm \(N(\, .\, )\) given on \(\mathbb{M}_{n}\). With the last result of the paper, he determines the structure of isometries of \(\mathbb{U}_{n}\) relative to any member of a new class of metrics on \(\mathbb{U}_{n}\) recently defined by \textit{H. F. Chau} et al. [J. Phys. A, Math. Theor. 45, No. 9, Article ID 095201 (2012; Zbl 1239.81032)]. The paper has two sections. In the first section, the author introduces the reader to some known results, describes the notations, and gives the statement of the main results (four theorems). These theorems are proved in the second section. With the final remark he suggests an open problem of describing the structure of all continuous Jordan triple endomorphisms from \( \mathbb{U}_{n}\) into another unitary group \(\mathbb{U}_{m}\) where \(m>n\).