We apply a method inspired by Popa's intertwining-by-bimodules technique to investigate inner conjugacy of MASAs in graph $C^*$-algebras. First, we give a new proof of non-inner conjugacy of the diagonal MASA ${\mathcal {D}}_E$ to its non-trivial image under a quasi-free automorphism, where $E$ is a finite transitive graph. Changing graphs representing the algebras, this result applies to some non quasi-free automorphisms as well. Then, we exhibit a large class of MASAs in the Cuntz algebra ${\mathcal {O}}_n$ that are not inner conjugate to the diagonal ${\mathcal {D}}_n$.

We prove a double commutant theorem for separable subalgebras of a wide class of corona C*-algebras, largely resolving a problem posed by Pedersen in 1988. Double commutant theorems originated with von Neumann, whose seminal result evolved into an entire field now called von Neumann algebra theory. Voiculescu later proved a C*-algebraic double commutant theorem for subalgebras of the Calkin algebra. We prove a similar result for subalgebras of a much more general class of so-called corona C*-algebras.

For amenable discrete groupoids $\mathcal {G}$ and row-finite directed graphs E, let $(\mathcal {G},E)$ be a self-similar groupoid and let $C^*(\mathcal {G}, E)$ be the associated $C^*$-algebra. We introduce a weaker faithfulness condition than those in the existing literature that still guarantees that $C^*(\mathcal {G})$ embeds in $C^*(\mathcal {G}, E)$. Under this faithfulness condition, we prove a gauge-invariant uniqueness theorem.

Given an irreducible lattice $\Gamma $ in the product of higher rank simple Lie groups, we prove a co-finiteness result for the $\Gamma $-invariant von Neumann subalgebras of the group von Neumann algebra $\mathcal {L}(\Gamma )$, and for the $\Gamma $-invariant unital $C^*$-subalgebras of the reduced group $C^*$-algebra $C^*_{\mathrm {red}}(\Gamma )$. We use these results to show that: (i) every $\Gamma $-invariant von Neumann subalgebra of $\mathcal {L}(\Gamma )$ is generated by a normal subgroup; and (ii) given a weakly mixing unitary representation $\pi $ of $\Gamma $, every $\Gamma $-equivariant conditional expectation on $C^*_\pi (\Gamma )$ is the canonical conditional expectation onto the $C^*$-subalgebra generated by a normal subgroup.

Let G be a locally compact unimodular group, and let $\phi $ be some function of n variables on G. To such a $\phi $, one can associate a multilinear Fourier multiplier, which acts on some n-fold product of the noncommutative $L_p$-spaces of the group von Neumann algebra. One may also define an associated Schur multiplier, which acts on an n-fold product of Schatten classes $S_p(L_2(G))$. We generalize well-known transference results from the linear case to the multilinear case. In particular, we show that the so-called “multiplicatively bounded $(p_1,\ldots ,p_n)$-norm” of a multilinear Schur multiplier is bounded above by the corresponding multiplicatively bounded norm of the Fourier multiplier, with equality whenever the group is amenable. Furthermore, we prove that the bilinear Hilbert transform is not bounded as a vector-valued map $L_{p_1}(\mathbb {R}, S_{p_1}) \times L_{p_2}(\mathbb {R}, S_{p_2}) \rightarrow L_{1}(\mathbb {R}, S_{1})$, whenever $p_1$ and $p_2$ are such that $\frac {1}{p_1} + \frac {1}{p_2} = 1$. A similar result holds for certain Calderón–Zygmund-type operators. This is in contrast to the nonvector-valued Euclidean case.

We present here a multiplicative version of the classical Kowalski–Słodkowski theorem, which identifies the characters among the collection of all functionals on a complex and unital Banach algebra A. In particular, we show that, if A is a $C^\star $-algebra, and if $\phi :A\to \mathbb C $ is a continuous function satisfying $ \phi (x)\phi (y) \in \sigma (xy) $ for all $x,y\in A$ (where $\sigma $ denotes the spectrum), then either $\phi $ is a character of A or $-\phi $ is a character of A.

We provide an abstract characterization for the Cuntz semigroup of unital commutative AI-algebras, as well as a characterization for abstract Cuntz semigroups of the form $\operatorname {\mathrm {Lsc}} (X,\overline {\mathbb {N}})$ for some $T_1$-space X. In our investigations, we also uncover new properties that the Cuntz semigroup of all AI-algebras satisfies.

In this paper, we prove a noncommutative (nc) analog of Schwarz lemma for the nc Schur–Agler class and prove that the regular nc Schur–Agler class and the regular free Herglotz–Agler class are homeomorphic. Moreover, we give a characterization of regular free Herglotz–Agler functions. As an application, we will show that any regular free Herglotz–Agler functions can uniformly be approximated by regular Herglotz–Agler free polynomials.

For a given inverse semigroup action on a topological space, one can associate an étale groupoid. We prove that there exists a correspondence between the certain subsemigroups and the open wide subgroupoids in case that the action is strongly tight. Combining with the recent result of Brown et al., we obtain a correspondence between the certain subsemigroups of an inverse semigroup and the Cartan intermediate subalgebras of a groupoid C*-algebra.

We use tools from free probability to study the spectra of Hermitian operators on infinite graphs. Special attention is devoted to universal covering trees of finite graphs. For operators on these graphs, we derive a new variational formula for the spectral radius and provide new proofs of results due to Sunada and Aomoto using free probability.

With the goal of extending the applicability of free probability techniques beyond universal covering trees, we introduce a new combinatorial product operation on graphs and show that, in the noncommutative probability context, it corresponds to the notion of freeness with amalgamation. We show that Cayley graphs of amalgamated free products of groups, as well as universal covering trees, can be constructed using our graph product.

In this paper, we construct uncountably many examples of multiparameter CCR flows, which are not pullbacks of $1$-parameter CCR flows, with any given index. Moreover, the constructed CCR flows are type I in the sense that the associated product system is the smallest subsystem containing its units.

We resolve the isomorphism problem for tensor algebras of unital multivariable dynamical systems. Specifically, we show that unitary equivalence after a conjugation for multivariable dynamical systems is a complete invariant for complete isometric isomorphisms between their tensor algebras. In particular, this settles a conjecture of Davidson and Kakariadis, Inter. Math. Res. Not. 2014 (2014), 1289–1311 relating to work of Arveson, Acta Math. 118 (1967), 95–109 from the 1960s, and extends related work of Kakariadis and Katsoulis, J. Noncommut. Geom. 8 (2014), 771–787.

In Kiukas, Lahti, and Ylinen (2006, Journal of Mathematical Physics 47, 072104), the authors asked the following general question. When is a positive operator measure projection valued? A version of this question formulated in terms of operator moments was posed in Pietrzycki and Stochel (2021, Journal of Functional Analysis 280, 109001). Let T be a self-adjoint operator, and let F be a Borel semispectral measure on the real line with compact support. For which positive integers $p< q$ do the equalities $T^k =\int _{\mathbb {R}} x^k F(\mathrm {d\hspace {.1ex}} x)$, $k=p, q$, imply that F is a spectral measure? In the present paper, we completely solve the second problem. The answer is affirmative if $p$ is odd and $q$ is even, and negative otherwise. The case $(p,q)=(1,2)$ closely related to intrinsic noise operator was solved by several authors including Kruszyński and de Muynck, as well as Kiukas, Lahti, and Ylinen. The counterpart of the second problem concerning the multiplicativity of unital positive linear maps on $C^*$-algebras is also provided.

We investigate dynamical systems consisting of a locally compact Hausdorff space equipped with a partially defined local homeomorphism. Important examples of such systems include self-covering maps, one-sided shifts of finite type and, more generally, the boundary-path spaces of directed and topological graphs. We characterize the topological conjugacy of these systems in terms of isomorphisms of their associated groupoids and C*-algebras. This significantly generalizes recent work of Matsumoto and of the second- and third-named authors.

We introduce Poisson boundaries of II$_1$ factors with respect to density operators that give the traces. The Poisson boundary is a von Neumann algebra that contains the II$_1$ factor and is a particular example of the boundary of a unital completely positive map as introduced by Izumi. Studying the inclusion of the II$_1$ factor into its boundary, we develop a number of notions, such as double ergodicity and entropy, that can be seen as natural analogues of results regarding the Poisson boundaries introduced by Furstenberg. We use the techniques developed to answer a problem of Popa by showing that all finite factors satisfy his MV property. We also extend a result of Nevo by showing that property (T) factors give rise to an entropy gap.

We characterize the noncommutative Aleksandrov–Clark measures and the minimal realization formulas of contractive and, in particular, isometric noncommutative rational multipliers of the Fock space. Here, the full Fock space over $\mathbb {C} ^d$ is defined as the Hilbert space of square-summable power series in several noncommuting (NC) formal variables, and we interpret this space as the noncommutative and multivariable analogue of the Hardy space of square-summable Taylor series in the complex unit disk. We further obtain analogues of several classical results in Aleksandrov–Clark measure theory for noncommutative and contractive rational multipliers.

Noncommutative measures are defined as positive linear functionals on a certain self-adjoint subspace of the Cuntz–Toeplitz algebra, the unital $C^*$-algebra generated by the left creation operators on the full Fock space. Our results demonstrate that there is a fundamental relationship between NC Hardy space theory, representation theory of the Cuntz–Toeplitz and Cuntz algebras, and the emerging field of noncommutative rational functions.

For a state $\omega$ on a C$^{*}$-algebra $A$, we characterize all states $\rho$ in the weak* closure of the set of all states of the form $\omega \circ \varphi$, where $\varphi$ is a map on $A$ of the form $\varphi (x)=\sum \nolimits _{i=1}^{n}a_i^{*}xa_i,$ $\sum \nolimits _{i=1}^{n}a_i^{*}a_i=1$ ($a_i\in A$, $n\in \mathbb {N}$). These are precisely the states $\rho$ that satisfy $\|\rho |J\|\leq \|\omega |J\|$ for each ideal $J$ of $A$. The corresponding question for normal states on a von Neumann algebra $\mathcal {R}$ (with the weak* closure replaced by the norm closure) is also considered. All normal states of the form $\omega \circ \psi$, where $\psi$ is a quantum channel on $\mathcal {R}$ (that is, a map of the form $\psi (x)=\sum \nolimits _ja_j^{*}xa_j$, where $a_j\in \mathcal {R}$ are such that the sum $\sum \nolimits _ja_j^{*}a_j$ converge to $1$ in the weak operator topology) are characterized. A variant of this topic for hermitian functionals instead of states is investigated. Maximally mixed states are shown to vanish on the strong radical of a C$^{*}$-algebra and for properly infinite von Neumann algebras the converse also holds.

We compute the generator rank of a subhomogeneous $C^*\!$-algebra in terms of the covering dimension of the pieces of its primitive ideal space corresponding to irreducible representations of a fixed dimension. We deduce that every $\mathcal {Z}$-stable approximately subhomogeneous algebra has generator rank one, which means that a generic element in such an algebra is a generator.

This leads to a strong solution of the generator problem for classifiable, simple, nuclear $C^*\!$-algebras: a generic element in each such algebra is a generator. Examples of Villadsen show that this is not the case for all separable, simple, nuclear $C^*\!$-algebras.

We prove that many, but not all, injective factors arise as crossed products by nonsingular Bernoulli actions of the group $\mathbb {Z}$. We obtain this result by proving a completely general result on the ergodicity, type and Krieger’s associated flow for Bernoulli shifts with arbitrary base spaces. We prove that the associated flow must satisfy a structural property of infinite divisibility. Conversely, we prove that all almost periodic flows, as well as many other ergodic flows, do arise as associated flow of a weakly mixing Bernoulli action of any infinite amenable group. As a byproduct, we prove that all injective factors with almost periodic flow of weights are infinite tensor products of $2 \times 2$ matrices. Finally, we construct Poisson suspension actions with prescribed associated flow for any locally compact second countable group that does not have property (T).

We establish a theory of noncommutative (NC) functions on a class of von Neumann algebras with a particular direct sum property, e.g., $B({\mathcal H})$ . In contrast to the theory’s origins, we do not rely on appealing to results from the matricial case. We prove that the $k{\mathrm {th}}$ directional derivative of any NC function at a scalar point is a k-linear homogeneous polynomial in its directions. Consequences include the fact that NC functions defined on domains containing scalar points can be uniformly approximated by free polynomials as well as realization formulas for NC functions bounded on particular sets, e.g., the NC polydisk and NC row ball.