\({\mathcal COL}_p\) spaces -- the local structure of non-commutative \(L_p\) spaces (Q1882618)

The paper under review deals with several operator space analogues of \({\mathcal L}_p\)-spaces. Let \(X\) be an operator space and let \(p\geq 1\). It is said that \(X\) is an \({\mathcal OL}_{p}\) space if for some constant \(\lambda >1\), there exist a family \((F_i)_i\) of finite-dimensional subspaces of \(X\) and a family \((A_i)_i\) of finite-dimensional \(C^*\)-algebras such that \(\bigcup_i F_i\) is dense in \(X\), and \(d_{ cb}(L_p(A_i), F_i)\leq\lambda\) for all \(i\) (here, \(L_p(A)\) stands for the standard noncommutative \(L_p\)-space associated with \(A\), and \(d_{cb}\) is the ``completely bounded Banach--Mazur distance'' for operator spaces). If moreover, the \(F_i\)'s are uniformly completely complemented, then \(X\) is called a \(\mathcal{COL}_p\)-space. For the case where the \(A_i\)'s are matrix algebras, \(X\) is a \(\mathcal{OS}_p\) (respectively, \(\mathcal{COS}_p\)-space). The first result of the paper is a rather deep characterization of \(\mathcal{OS}_p\)-spaces. Let \(S_p^n = L_p(M_n)\) denote the finite-dimensional Schatten space associated with the matrix algebra \(M_n\). Assume that \(X\) is such that there exist a constant \(C\geq 1\) and nets of completely bounded maps \(s_t\colon X\to S_p^{n_t}\) and \(r_t\colon S_p^{n_t}\to X\) such that \(\| s_t\|_{cb}\| r_t\|_{ cb}\leq C\) and \(r_ts_t(x)\to x\) for all \(x\in X\). Then \(X\) is an \(\mathcal{OS}_p\) (respectively, \(\mathcal{COS}_p\)) if \(X\) contains \(S_p^n\)'s uniformly (respectively, uniformly complemented). Using the above result, the following equivalence was deduced: For \(1<p<\infty\) and if \(X\) has the (CBAP), then the following assertions are equivalent: (i) \(X\) is an \(\mathcal{OS}_p\) (respectively, \(\mathcal{COS}_p\)); (ii) \(X\) contains the \(S_p^n\)'s uniformly (resp., uniformly complemented), and \(X\) is completely complemented in an ultrapower of the Schatten space \(S^p\). The next important result is a duality for \(\mathcal{COL}_p\)-spaces: if \(1<p<\infty\) and \(1/p +1/{p'}=1\), then \(X\) is a \(\mathcal{COL}_p\)-space if and only if its dual operator space \(X^*\) is a \(\mathcal{COL}_{p'}\) space. The second part of the paper is devoted to the special case where \(X=L^p(N)\) for a semifinite von Neumann algebra \(N\). The last major section of the paper deals with \(cb\)-bases for operator spaces. The main result of this section states that for \(1<p<\infty\), the separable \(\mathcal{COL}_p\)-spaces have \(cb\)-bases. As an application, it is shown that \(L_p(N)\) has a \(cb\)-basis provided that it has (CBAP) and \(N\) has QWEP. A very important example of this situation: if \(F_n\) denotes the free group with \(n\geq 1\) generators, then for \(1<p<\infty\), \(L_p(VN(F_n))\) has a cb-basis.