Operators with large trace, and a characterization of

Abstract

Let E be a real or complex n-dimensional normed space. Deschaseaux (1) has shown that if the absolutely summing constant π1(E) = n then E is isometrically isomorphic to . (For the definition of π1(E) and related quantities, see (2).) It is well-known ((3), (4) and (6)) that if E is a P1-space then E is isometrically isomorphic to . We shall show that Deschaseaux' result follows easily from this, and from the following elementary result: Proposition. If S is a linear operator on a real or complex n-dimensional normed space E, then |trace S| ≤ ‖S‖, with equality if and only if S is a scalar multiple of the identity I.