Real zero polynomials and Pólya-Schur type theorems (Q2565877)

Let \(\mathcal{P}(\mathbb{C})\) denote the space of all polynomials with complex coefficients, and let \(D, D_*, D_{\sharp}\) stand for the operators given by \(Dz^n=nz^{n-1}\), \(D_*=zD\), and \(D_{\sharp}=z^2D\). An important subspace of \(\mathcal{P}(\mathbb{C})\) consists of the polynomials with real zeros, denoted by \(\mathcal{P}(\mathbb{C};\mathbb{R})\). A linear operator \(T:\mathcal{P}(\mathbb{C})\rightarrow \mathcal{P}(\mathbb{C})\) is said to be real zero preserving if \(T(\mathcal{P}(\mathbb{C};\mathbb{R}))\subset \mathcal{P}(\mathbb{C};\mathbb{R})\). By the Gauss-Lucas theorem, all three operators \(D,D_*\) and \(D_{\sharp}\) are real zero preserving. In this paper the authors establish the following Theorem: Let \(T:\mathcal{P}(\mathbb{C})\rightarrow \mathcal{P}(\mathbb{C})\) be a linear operator which commutes with \(D_{\sharp}\). Then \(T\) preserves real zeros if and only if it is of the form \[ T=F(D_{\sharp})+L \, , \] where \(F\) is a complex polynomial and \(L\) is the rank one operator given by \[ L[p](z)=\lambda_0p(0)+\lambda_1p\,'(0) \, . \] This result is the analogue of theorems of Pólya-Benz and Pólya-Schur, which give characterizations of the real zero preserving linear operators \(T\) commuting with either \(D\) or \(D_*\).