Centralisers of spaces of symmetric tensor products and applications (Q2509051)

Let \(E\) be a Banach space. The set of \textit{multipliers of \(E\),} Mult\((E),\) is the collection of bounded linear operators \(T:E \to E\) such that every extreme point \(e\) of the dual unit ball \(B_{E^\prime}\) is an eigenvalue of \(T^\prime;\) that is, \(T^\prime(e) = a_T(e)e\) for some scalar \(a_T(e)\). The centraliser of \(E\), \(Z(E),\) is the set of \(T \in \text{ Mult}(E)\) such that for some \(S \in \text{Mult}(E)\), \(S^\prime(e) = \overline{a_T(e)}e\) for all extreme points \(e \in B_{E^\prime}\). \textit{A.\,W.\,Wickstead} [Pac.\ J.\ Math.\ 65, 563--571 (1976; Zbl 0318.46080)] investigated the centraliser of the completed injective tensor product of two Banach spaces \(E\) and \(F,\) showing, for example, that if \(E\) and \(F\) are both dual spaces, then \(Z(E \widehat{\otimes}_\epsilon F) = Z(E) \widehat{\otimes}_\epsilon Z(F)\). Fifteen years later, \textit{W.\,Werner} [Bull.\ Aust.\ Math.\ Soc.\ 44, No.\,3, 357--365 (1991; Zbl 0752.46045)] described \(Z(E \widehat{\otimes}_\epsilon F)\) as a space of bounded continuous functions. Here, the authors investigate the centraliser of spaces of symmetric tensor products. The addition of symmetry is crucial, as is shown by Theorem 3: If \(E\) is a real Banach space, then for any \(n \geq 2\), \(Z(\widehat{\bigotimes}_{n,s,\epsilon}E)\) is trivial (i.e., the only operators in this algebra are multiples of the identity). An application provides a version of the Banach--Stone property for both \(\widehat{\bigotimes}_{n,s,\epsilon}E\) and \(\widehat{\bigotimes}_{n,s,\epsilon}E^\prime\), the latter space being isometrically isomorphic to the space \(\mathcal{P}_A(^nE)\) of continuous \(n\)-homogeneous approximable polynomials on \(E\). This also leads to an improvement of a result of the authors in [J.~Funct.\ Anal.\ 224, No.\,2, 281--295 (2005; Zbl 1082.46033)]: Let \(E\) be a real Banach space whose dual has the approximation property, let \(F\) be a smooth, reflexive, real Banach space, and let \(n \geq 2\). If \(T:\mathcal{P}_A(^nE;F) \to \mathcal{P}_A(^nE;F)\) is an isometry, then there are isometries \(s:E^\prime \to E^\prime\) and \(S:F \to F\) such that for all \(P \in \mathcal{P}_A(^nE;F)\), \(T(P) = S(\tilde{P} \circ s^\prime \circ J_E)\). (Here, \(\tilde P\) is the canonical extension of \(P\) to \(E^{\prime\prime}\) and \(J_E:E \to E^{\prime\prime}\) is the canonical embedding.) The second half of the paper deals with the (considerably murkier) subject of the centralizer of \(\mathcal{P}_A(^nE)\) when \(E\) is a complex Banach space.