On metrizability of compactoid sets in non-archimedean locally convex spaces (Q735425)

One interesting problem in classical Functional Analysis concerns the metrizability of compact sets and has been extensively studied by several authors. However, in Functional Analysis over non-archimedean valued fields \(K\), the problem becomes more delicate, since precompactness is a restrictive concept. In fact, the existence of a convex precompact set with more than one point in a locally convex space implies that \(K\) is locally compact, which is not always the case. The adequate non-archimedean substitute of precompactness is compactoidity, introduced by \textit{L.\,Gruson} and \textit{M.\,van der Put} [Bull.\ Soc.\ Math.\ Fr., Suppl., Mém.\ 39--40, 55--100 (1974; Zbl 0312.46029)]. In [Contemp.\ Math.\ 319, 99--107 (2003; Zbl 1054.46051)], \textit{N.\,De~Grande-De~Kimpe}, the first author of the present paper and the reviewer, proved that compactoid sets in non-archimedean Hausdorff (LM)-spaces (i.e., Hausdorff inductive limits of inductive sequences of non-archimedean metrizable spaces) are metrizable. In the paper under review, the authors provide a larger class of non-archimedean locally convex spaces for which every compactoid set is metrizable: the class \({\mathcal L}\) of Hausdorff locally convex spaces over \(K\) with a decreasing base \((U_{\alpha})_{\alpha \in \mathbb N^\mathbb N}\) of neighbourhoods of zero. This extends the mentioned result for (LM)-spaces, since every (LM)-space is in \({\mathcal L}\); at the same time, this leads to a simpler proof than the one given in 2003 for those inductive limits, which involved \(t\)-frames and tensor products. This is good news for the reviewer! A key point to get this metrizability for compactoid sets in spaces of \({\mathcal L}\) is the result, proved in the paper, establishing that a Hausdorff locally convex space \(E\) over \(K\) with a compactoid resolution \((A_{\alpha})_{\alpha \in \mathbb N^\mathbb N}\) (i.e., an increasing family \((A_{\alpha})_{\alpha \in \mathbb N^\mathbb N}\) of compactoid sets such that \(\bigcup_{\alpha \in \mathbb N^\mathbb N} A_{\alpha}=E)\) is of countable type. The authors also study stability properties of the class \({\mathcal L}\), among them the one that assures that if \((E_n)_n\) is a projective sequence in \({\mathcal L}\), then the projective limit of this sequence is also in \({\mathcal L}\). In particular, for projective limits of Hausdorff (LM)-spaces (which need not be (LM)-spaces), the compactoid sets are metrizable, which shows that the metrizability result of this paper essentially extends the one of 2003 given by the authors previously cited.