In [6] Conway and Morrell characterized those operators on Hilbert space that are points of continuity of the spectrum. They also gave necessary and sufficient conditions that a biquasitriangular operator be a point of spectral continuity. Our point of view in this note is slightly different. Given a point T of spectral continuity, we ask what can then be inferred. Several of our results deal with invariant subspaces. We also give some conditions characterizing a biquasitriangular point of spectral continuity (Theorem 3). One of these is that the operator and its adjoint both have the single-valued extension property.

In a recent paper [7], Rooney used a technique involving the Mellin transform to obtain solutions in certain spaces ℒμ, ρ of an integral equation which had been studied previously by Šub-Sizonenko [9]. The integral equation in question can be written as

where I denotes the identity operator and G0.1/2 is given by

with the inversion formula obtained by Rooney taking the form

Rooney verified that (1.1) and (1.2) formed an inversion pair in ℒμ, ρ for 1 ≤ p < ∞ and μ > 0.

Let G be a compact, simply-connected Lie group. The cohomology of the loop space ΏG has been described by Bott, both in terms of a cell decomposition [1] and certain homogeneous spaces called generating varieties [2]. It is possible to view ΏG as an infinite dimensional “Grassmannian” associated to an appropriate infinite dimensional group, cf. [3], [7]. From this point of view the above cell-decomposition of Bott arises from a Bruhat decomposition of the associated group. We choose a generator H ∈ H2(ΏG, ℤ) and call it the hyperplane class. For a finite-dimensional Grassmannian the highest power of H carries geometric information about the variety, namely, its degree. An analogous question for ΏG is: What is the largest integer Nk = Nk(G) which divides Hk ∈ H2k(ΏG, ℤ)?

Of course, if G = SU(2) = S3, one knows Nk = h!. In general, the deviation of Nk from k! measures the failure of H to generate a divided polynomial algebra in H*(ΏG, ℤ).

For each natural number n, let un(x)=(1—cos nx)/πnx2(xɛℝ). It is well–known that a bounded continuous function f on the real line ℝ is the Fourier transform of an integrable function on ℝ if and only if the functions Φn(f) (n= 1, 2,…), defined by

form a Cauchy sequence in the space L1(ℝ) (cf. [2]). Such a characterization, which can be extended to functions defined on a locally compact Abelian group more general than ℝ, is based on the fact that the space L1(ℝ) is complete with respect to convergence in mean.

The following general problem is of interest. Let Λ be an irreducible algebraic variety of degree d, in projective n-space Pn, defined over a field k; and suppose that K is a finite extension of k with [K: k] prime to d. If Λ has a point defined over K, then does it necessarily have a point defined over k?

It has been studied in various instances by several authors: see, for example, Cassels [2], Coray [3, 4], Pfister [5], Bremner, Lewis, Morton [1]. Coray [3] shows that a quartic curve Λ over Q may possess points in extension fields of Q of every odd degree greater than one, but have no points in Q itself. Some further examples of this instance occur in the paper of Bremner, Lewis, Morton, with the additional property that the curve Λ also possesses points in every p-adic completion Qp of Q.

R. C. James [2] (or see p. 7ff of [3]) gave a useful representation of the bidual of any space with a shrinking basis. This note gives a representation of the bidual of any space with a basis.

Our notation follows that of [3], where undefined terms can be found. Let {en} be a basic sequence with coefficient functionals {fn}. We will assume {en} is bimonotone; that is

. The space {en}LIM is the set of scalar sequences {an} so that ∥{an}∥ = . We will abuse notation and squate such {an} with the formal sum Σ anen.

Peter May kindly tells me that the proof of the Nishida relations in §8 of this paper works only for E∞ spaces, not for H∞ ring spectra. The reason is that there is no suitable “diagonal” map d for H∞ ring spectra. The result is correct all the same (it is not mine), and its formulation in §3 is also correct.