A noncommutative martingale convexity inequality (Q282487)

The convexity inequality of \textit{K. Ball} et al. [Invent. Math. 115, No. 3, 463--482 (1994; Zbl 0803.47037)] for the Schatten classes \(S_p\) states that for \(1<p\leq2\) the following inequality holds: \[ \| x+y\|^2_p+ \| x-y\| _p^2\geq2 \| x\|_p^2 +2(p-1) \| y\|_p^2\qquad (x, y\in S_p), \] and if \(2<p<\infty\), the reversed inequality is valid. Furthermore, \(p-1\) is the best constant. The authors extend this inequality to the noncommutative setting. More precisely, let \(\mathcal M\) be a von Neumann algebra equipped with a faithful semifinite normal weight \(\phi\), whose associated noncommutative \(L_p\)-spaces are denoted by \(L_p(\mathcal M)\), let \(\mathcal N\) be a von Neumann subalgebra of \(\mathcal M\) such that the restriction of \(\phi\) to \(\mathcal N\) is semifinite and such that \(\mathcal N\) is invariant under the modular group of \(\phi\) and let \(\mathcal E\) be the weight preserving conditional expectation from \(\mathcal M\) onto \(\mathcal N\). Then the authors prove that for all \(x, y\in L_p(\mathcal M)\), the following inequalities hold: \[ \| x+y\|^2_p+ \| x-y\| _p^2\geq2 \| x\|_p^2 +2(p-1) \| y\|_p^2 \] and \[ \| x\|_{p}^2\geq\bigl\|\mathcal E(x)\bigr\|_p^2+(p-1)\bigl\| x-\mathcal E(x)\bigr\| _p^2 \] whenever \(1<p\leq 2\) and, if \(2<p<\infty\), the inequality is reversed. As a consequence, for the Poisson semigroup of a free group, they obtain the optimal time for the hypercontractivity from \(L_2\) to \(L_q\) for \(q\geq4\).