Harte (1982, Math. Z.179, 431–436) initiated the study of Fredholm theory relative to a unital homomorphism T: A → B between unital Banach algebras A and B based on the following notions: an element a ∈ A is called Fredholm if 0 is not in the spectrum of Ta, while a is Weyl (Browder) if there exist (commuting) elements b and c in A with a = b + c such that 0 is not in the spectrum of b and c is in the null space of T. We introduce and investigate the concepts of r-Fredholm, r-Weyl and r-Browder elements, where 0 in these definitions is replaced by the spectral radii of a and b, respectively.

We prove two results about nonunital index theory left open in a previous paper. The first is that the spectral triple arising from an action of the reals on a ${{C}^{*}}$-algebra with invariant trace satisfies the hypotheses of the nonunital local index formula. The second result concerns the meaning of spectral flow in the nonunital case. For the special case of paths arising from the odd index pairing for smooth spectral triples in the nonunital setting, we are able to connect with earlier approaches to the analytic definition of spectral flow.

A hermitian algebra is a unital associative ℂ-algebra endowed with an involution such that the spectra of self-adjoint elements are contained in ℝ. In the case of an algebra 𝒜 endowed with a Mackey-complete, locally convex topology such that the set of invertible elements is open and the inversion mapping is continuous, we construct the smooth structures on the appropriate versions of flag manifolds. Then we prove that if such a locally convex algebra 𝒜 is endowed with a continuous involution, then it is a hermitian algebra if and only if the natural action of all unitary groups Un(𝒜) on each flag manifold is transitive.

The paper introduces and studies the weighted g-Drazin inverse for bounded linear operators between Banach spaces, extending the concept of the weighted Drazin inverse of Rakočević and Wei (Linear Algebra Appl. 350 (2002), 25–39) and of Cline and Greville (Linear Algebra Appl. 29 (1980), 53–62). We use the Mbekhta decomposition to study the structure of an operator possessing the weighted g-Drazin inverse, give an operator matrix representation for the inverse, and study its continuity. An open problem of Rakočević and Wei is solved.

We study complex commutative Banach algebras (and, more generally, continuous inverse algebras) in which the holomorphic functions of a fixed $n$-tuple of elements are dense. In particular, we characterize the compact subsets of ${{\mathbb{C}}^{n}}$ which appear as joint spectra of such $n$ -tuples. The characterization is compared with several established notions of holomorphic convexity by means of approximation conditions.

The paper introduces and studies the weighted g-Drazin inverse for bounded linear operators between Banach spaces, extending the concept of the weighted Drazin inverse of Rakočević and Wei (Linear Algebra Appl. 350 (2002), 25–39) and of Cline and Greville (Linear Algebra Appl. 29(1980), 53–62). We use the Mbekhta decomposition to study the structure of an operator possessing the weighted g-Drazin inverse, give an operator matrix representation for the inverse, and study its continuity. An open problem of Rakočević and Wei is solved.

The connection between Clifford analysis and the Weyl functional calculus for a d-tuple of bounded selfadjoint operators is used to prove a geometric condition due to J. Bazer and D. H. Y. Yen for a point to be in the support of the Weyl functional calculus for a pair of hermitian matrices. Examples are exhibited in which the support has gaps.