Essential spectrum and Feller type properties (Q6113052)

The authors give necessary and sufficient conditions for a regular semi-Dirichlet form to enjoy a new Feller type property, which they call the weak Feller property. The research is inspired by a result by \textit{H. D. Lenz} and \textit{P. R. M. Stollmann} on the essential spectrum [J. Spectr. Theory 9, No. 3, 1089--1113 (2019; Zbl 1432.35146)]. The main goal of this paper is to obtain a variant this result, which allows to treat geometries such as arbitrary \(\mathrm{RCD}^*\) spaces. To this end, the authors found a connection between such results and probability theory. They say that a regular semi-Dirichlet form \(\mathscr{E}\) on \(\mathrm{L}^2(X)\) with associated sectorial operator \(H\) and associated semigroup \(T_t :=\mathrm{e}^{-tH}\) has the \textit{weak Feller property} if \(T_t(\mathrm{L}_0^\infty(X))\subseteq\mathrm{L}_0^\infty(X)\) for all \(t>0\) and, for any compact \(K \subseteq X\), there exists a function \(0 \leq w \in \mathrm{L}^2(X) \cap \mathrm{L}^\infty_0(X)\) with \((H+1)^{-1}w\geq\textbf{1}_K\). On Riemannian manifolds, the induced Feller property and the weak Feller property are equivalent. Finally, the authors also obtain a variant of Persson's theorem.