Linear functional analysis. An application-oriented introduction. Translated from the 6th German edition by Robert Nürnberg (Q299565)

Functional analysis evolved as a natural gathering point for a number of investigations regarding the solvability of many classes of problems, including ordinary and partial differential equations, or linear equations which are either in the form of integral equations or in the form of countable systems of linear scalar equations in which the unknown is a sequence of numbers. As the subject developed, much broader areas of applicability became evident. These applications, in turn, spawned further abstract development, and the abstract results themselves assumed an intrinsic interest. The author's aim is to give a systematic treatment of some of the fundamental abstract results in linear functional analysis and of their applications to certain concrete problems in linear differential and partial differential equations. The subject covered in this book is at the interplay between algebra, topology, and analysis. Moreover, by interlacing extensive commentary and foreshadowing subsequent developments within the formal scheme of statements and proofs, by the inclusion of many apt examples and by appending interesting and challenging exercises, the author has written a book which is eminently suitable as a text for a graduate course. This volume is distinguished by the broad variety of problems covered and by the abstract results developed. The content of the book is divided into 11 chapters, as follows: 1. Preliminaries; 2. Function spaces; 3. Subsets of function spaces; 4. Linear operators; 5. Linear functionals; 6. Uniform boundedness principle; 7. Weak convergence; 8. Finite-dimensional approximation; 9. Compact operators; 10. Spectrum of compact operators; 11. Self-adjoint operators. The text is self-contained and includes all proofs, as well as many exercises, most of them with solutions. Moreover, there are a number of appendices, for example on Lebesgue integration theory. In summary, this book is a tour de force by the author. The volume under review deals rigorously with mathematical models of certain applicability to real world problems. From this viewpoint it is a significant contribution to a currently active area of research. A complete introduction to the subject, this book will be particularly useful to readers who want to quickly get to the key statements and who are interested in applications to differential equations. Globally, the reviewer very much likes the spirit and the scope of the book. The writing is lively, the material is diverse and maintains a strong unity. The interplay between abstract functional analysis and relevant concrete problems arising in applications is emphasized throughout. On balance, the book is a very useful contribution to the growing literature on this circle of ideas. I wholeheartedly recommend this book both as a textbook, as well as for independent study. For the 6th German edition see [\textit{H. W. Alt}, Lineare Funktionalanalysis. Eine anwendungsorientierte Einführung. 6th revised ed. Berlin: Springer (2012; Zbl 1243.46001)].