Spectral radius, numerical radius, and the product of operators (Q465434)

The authors investigate relations between the spectral radius of a product of two Hilbert space operators and their numerical radii. Let \(H\) be a Hilbert space of dimension at least \(2\) and let \(A\in B(H)\). Let \(\sigma(A)\), \(\rho(A)\), \(W(A)\), and \(r(A)\) denote, respectively, the spectrum, the spectral radius, the numerical range, and the numerical radius of the operator \(A\). The result proved in the paper reads as follows: {Theorem}. Let \(A\in B(H)\) be nonzero. Then the following are equivalent. {\parindent=6mm \begin{itemize} \item[(1)] \(\rho(AB)\leq r(A)r(B)\) for all \(B\in B(H)\). \item [(2)] \(\rho(AB)\leq r(A)r(B)\) for all rank one \(B\in B(H)\). \item [(3)] There is a unique \(\mu\in\sigma(A)\) such that \(|\mu|=\rho(A)\) and \(\| A/\mu-I/2\|\leq\frac{1}{2}\), i.e., \(A=\mu(I+L)/2\) for a contraction \(L\) with \(1\in\sigma(L)\). \end{itemize}} In the case where \(H\) has dimension \(n<\infty\), conditions \((1)\)--\((3)\) are equivalent to the following. There is a unique \(\mu\in\sigma(A)\) such that \(|\mu|=\rho(A)\) and the matrix \(A\) is unitarily similar to \(\mu(I_p\otimes 0_q\otimes C)\) where \(1\leq p\leq n\), \(0\leq q\leq n-p\), and \(C\) is invertible with \(\| C-I/2\|\leq\frac{1}{2}\); equivalently, \(W(C^{-1})\subset\{z: \mathrm{Re}(z)\geq 1\}\).