Essential spectra of quasi-parabolic composition operators on Hardy spaces of analytic functions (Q629235)

Recall that for a symbol \(\varphi\), the composition operator with symbol \(\varphi\) is the operator \(C_{\varphi}\) defined by \(C_{\varphi}(f)=f\circ\varphi\). It is of interest to understand the operator theoretic behavior of \(C_{\varphi}\) in terms of the function theoretic information on \(\varphi\). This paper studies the essential spectra of composition operators on the Hardy space \(H^2(\mathbb{D})\) and the Hardy space of the upper half plane. Recall that the class of quasicontinuous functions is given by \[ QC=\left[H^\infty(\mathbb{D})\cap C(\mathbb{T})\right]\cap \left[\overline{H^\infty(\mathbb{D})\cap C(\mathbb{T})}\right]. \] Also, recall that the set of cluster points of \(\mathcal{C}_{\xi}(\varphi)\) of a function \(\varphi\in H^\infty(\mathbb{D})\) is defined to be the set of points \(z\in\mathbb{C}\) for which there is a sequence \(\{z_n\}\subset \mathbb{D}\) so that \(z_n\to\xi\) and \(\varphi(z_n)\to z\). The main result of the paper is the following result that provides some information about the essential normality of the operator \(C_{\varphi}\) and its essential spectrum for a certain special class of symbols. Theorem. Let \(\varphi:\mathbb{D}\to\mathbb{D}\) be an analytic self-map of \(\mathbb{D}\) such that \[ \varphi(z)=\frac{2iz+\eta(z)(1-z)}{2i+\eta(z)(1-z)}\,, \] where \(\eta\in H^\infty(\mathbb{D})\) with \(\text{Im}(\eta(z))>\epsilon>0\) for all \(z\in \mathbb{D}\). If \(\eta\in QC\cap H^\infty\), then {\parindent=6.5mm \begin{itemize}\item[(1)] \(C_\varphi:H^2(\mathbb{D})\to H^2(\mathbb{D})\) is essentially normal; \item[(2)] \(\sigma_{e}(C_\varphi)=\{e^{izt}: t\in[0,\infty]\), \(z\in \mathcal{C}_1(\eta)\}\cup\{0\}\). \end{itemize}} An analogous result is obtained for the Hardy space on the upper half plane, see Theorem A in the paper for the precise statement.