Generalizations of Riesz potentials and \(L^ p\) estimates for certain k- plane transforms (Q801505)

Let \(M_{n,k}\) be the manifold of all k-dimensional affine subspaces of \({\mathbb{R}}^ n\). As \(M_{n,k}\) can be identified with a homogeneous space of the motion group \(M(n,{\mathbb{R}})=O(n,{\mathbb{R}})\ltimes {\mathbb{R}}^ n,\) there exists an M(n,\({\mathbb{R}})\)-invariant measure \(\mu\) on \(M_{n,k}\). Let dx be the Lebesgue-measure on \({\mathbb{R}}^ n\) and for \(\pi \in M_{n,k}\) let \(d_{\pi}x\) be the canonical Lebesgue-measure on the k- plane \(\pi\). For suitable real functions f, e.g. continuous and rapidly decreasing, define \(T_ kf\) by \(T_ kf(\pi)=\int_{\pi}f(x)d_{\pi}x.\) Thus \(T_ k\) defines a linear transformation from functions on \({\mathbb{R}}^ n\) to functions on \(M_{n,k}\). Clearly \(T_{n-1}\) is just the Radon transform. The main result of the paper (theorem 2) is as follows: Let \(1\leq q\leq n+1,\quad p=(n+(q-1)k)^{-1}nq.\) Then for \(n\leq 2k+1\) the transformation \(T_ k\) defines a bounded operator from \(L^ p({\mathbb{R}}^ n)\) into \(L^ q(M_{n,k},\mu)\). As the author remarks, meanwhile M. Christ has shown that one can dispense with the condition on k, i.e., \(T_ k\) is bounded for all k, \(1\leq k\leq n.\) The main tool in the present proof is the study of an analytic family of operators \(A_ z\) on \({\mathcal D}({\mathbb{R}}^{n(n+1)})\), the space of Schwartz test functions, defined by \(A_ z(F)=\gamma_ n(z)\int F(x)\Delta (x)^{-n+z}dx\) where \(\Delta (x)=| \det (x_ 1-x_ 0,...,x_ n-x_ 0)|\) for \(x=(x_ 0,x_ 1,...,x_ n)\in {\mathbb{R}}^ n\times...\times {\mathbb{R}}^ n={\mathbb{R}}^{n(n+1)}\) and \(\gamma_ n\) a \(\Gamma\)-factor. For \(F=f_ 0\otimes f_ 1\otimes...\otimes f_ n\) with \(f_ i\in {\mathcal D}({\mathbb{R}}^ n)\) one has the basic estimate \(| A_ z(F)| \leq c_{n,z}\prod^{n}_{0}\| f_ j\|_ p\) for all z and p with \((n-1)\leq Re z\leq n,\quad n+1=p(1+Re z),\) and the connection with the \(T_ k's\) is given by \(A_ k(F)=c_{n,k}\int \prod^{n}_{0}(T_ kf_ j)(\pi)d\mu (\pi).\) In the second part the author defines certain families of distributions \(\Omega_ z\) on \(G_{2k,k}\times G_{2k,k},\) where \(G_{n,k}\) is the Grassmannian of linear k-subspaces in \({\mathbb{R}}^ n\), and \(\Lambda_ z\) on \(M_{2k+1,k}\times M_{2k+1,k}\), which generalize the ordinary Riesz potentials. For \(\Lambda_ z\) a boundedness property is proved, which is applied to give another proof of theorem 2 in the case \(n=2k+1\).