Isometries of James spaces (Q579581)

This paper characterizes the group of invertible isometries of the James space \(J_ C\) (resp. \(J_ R)\) which consists of all sequences \(z=(z_ n)_ 1^{\infty}\in c_ 0\) of complex (resp. real) numbers for which the norm \[ \| z\|^ 2_ j=\sup_{p_ 1<p_ 2<...<p_{2n}}\{\sum^{n}_{i=1}| z_{p_{2i-1}}- z_{p_{2i}}|^ 2\} \] is finite. The authors show that such an isometry has two parts: multiplication by a scalar of modulus one \((T_{\alpha}\) where \(T_{\alpha}z=\alpha z\), \(| \alpha | =1)\) and a permutation \((T_{\sigma}\) where \((T_{\sigma}z)_ n=z_{\sigma (n)})\). The nature of the norm, however, restricts the possible permutations to just two: the identity and the one which interchanges 1 and 2. In particular, therefore, the group of isometries of \(J_ R\) onto itself is isomorphic to \({\mathbb{Z}}_ 2\times {\mathbb{Z}}_ 2\).