Automatic Continuity of Linear Operators

Abstract

The present survey is essentially based on some recent automatic continuity results which have been obtained by Ernst Albrecht and the author in the joint papers [1;2;3]. In contrast to the excellent account of automatic continuity theory in Sinclair's lecture notes [29] and in Dales' recent survey article [9], the emphasis of the present exposition lies on the automatic continuity problem for linear operators acting between spaces of functions and distributions. The continuity of such operators will be derived from certain conditions which naturally arise in the theory of linear systems, namely from time-invariance and causality on the one side and from dissipativity on the other. The automatic continuity of all time-invariant and causal linear operators turns out to be just one achievement of a far-reaching new theory on automatic continuity which also applies to the problem of continuity for algebrahomomorphisms, derivations, intertwining operators, and local operators. Some central features of this theory will be sketched; in particular, some extensions and variants of the classical principle of uniform boundedness will be discussed.