Property (RD) for Hecke pairs (Q694501)

The importance of the property of rapid decay (RD) of groups has long been recognized in several areas of mathematics including geometric group theory and operator algebras (particularly, in the \(K\)-theory of \(C^\ast\)-algebras). In the article under review, the author proposes a generalization of this property in the context of Hecke pairs \((G, H)\), where \(G\) is a (discrete) group with a subgroup \(H\) which is almost normal, i.e., every double coset is a finite union of left cosets. There are many interesting examples of such pairs arising in the theory of modular forms and dynamical systems (e.g., Bost-Connes theory). Let \(H\backslash G\) and \(H\backslash G/H\) be the set of right cosets and double cosets, respectively, and let \(\mathcal H(G, H)\) be the vector space of finitely supported complex functions on \(H\backslash G/H\). For \(f \in \mathcal H(G, H)\), define \(\lambda(f ) \in \mathcal B(l^2 (H\backslash G))\) by \[ \lambda(f )\xi(gH) = \sum_{H\tau\in H\backslash G} f (H\tau H)\xi (H\tau^{-1} g). \] The \(C^\ast\)-algebra generated by these operators is denoted by \(C^\ast_r (G, H)\), which is an analogue of the reduced group \(C^\ast\)-algebra for the Hecke pair \((G, H)\). The author defines a length function on (\(G, H)\) to be a map \(L : G \to [0, \infty)\) which satisfies the following: (i) \(L(gh) \leq L(g) + L(h)\), (ii) \(L(g^{ -1} ) = L(g)\) and (iii) \(L(h) = 0\) for all \(h \in H\). The pair \((G, H)\) is said to have the property RD if there is a length function \(L\) for which the following analogue of the Haagerup inequality holds: \[ \|\lambda(f )\| \leq C \biggl( \sum_{g\in G} |f ([g])|^2 (1 + L(g))^{2s} \biggr)^\frac12 \] for all \(f \in \mathcal H(G, H)\), where \(C, s\) are some positive real numbers, \(\|\lambda(f )\|\) denotes the operator-norm and \([g] = HgG\). Then the author studies the above property in detail, with several equivalent descriptions and interesting implications analogous to similar results known for groups with property RD. In particular, for a Hecke pair with property RD, a natural smooth subalgebra of \(C^\ast_r (G, H)\) is constructed which has spectral permanence making it convenient to compute \(K\)-theorectic invariants. Among other interesting results, let us mention the following: {\parindent=0.6cm\begin{itemize}\item[(i)] For a finite subgroup \(H\), \((G, H)\) has property RD if and only if \(G\) has property RD. \item[(ii)] Given a finitely generated group \(G\) with property RD and a finite group \(F\) acting on it, \((G_1 , F )\) is a Hecke pair with property RD, where \(G_1\) is the semidirect product of \(G\) by \(F\). \end{itemize}} This well-written article sets the stage for further studies of the \(C^\ast\)-algebras of Hecke pairs, with potential applications to number theory, dynamical systems and \(K\)-theory.