Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 February 2018
Given a Banach space X and a real number α ≥ 1, we write: (1) D(X) ≤ α if, for any locally finite metric space A, all finite subsets of which admit bilipschitz embeddings into X with distortions ≤ C, the space A itself admits a bilipschitz embedding into X with distortion ≤ α ⋅ C; (2) D(X) = α+ if, for every ϵ > 0, the condition D(X) ≤ α + ϵ holds, while D(X) ≤ α does not; (3) D(X) ≤ α+ if D(X) = α+ or D(X) ≤ α. It is known that D(X) is bounded by a universal constant, but the available estimates for this constant are rather large. The following results have been proved in this work: (1) D((⊕n=1∞Xn)p) ≤ 1+ for every nested family of finite-dimensional Banach spaces {Xn}n=1∞ and every 1 ≤ p ≤ ∞. (2) D((⊕n=1∞ ℓ∞n)p) = 1+ for 1 < p < ∞. (3) D(X) ≤ 4+ for every Banach space X with no nontrivial cotype. Statement (3) is a strengthening of the Baudier–Lancien result (2008).