Harm Bart - Böcker

This volume is dedicated to Rien Kaashoek on the occasion of his 80th birthday and celebrates his many contributions to the field of operator theory during more than fifty years. In the first part of the volume, biographical information and personal accounts on the life of Rien Kaashoek are presented. Eighteen research papers by friends and colleagues of Rien Kaashoek are included in the second part.Contributions by J. Agler, Z.A. Lykova, N.J. Young, J.A. Ball, G.J. Groenewald, S. ter Horst, H. Bart, T. Ehrhardt, B. Silbermann, J.M. Bogoya, S.M. Grudsky, I.S. Malysheva, A. Böttcher, E. Wegert, Z. Zhou, Y. Eidelman, I. Haimovici, A.E. Frazho, A.C.M. Ran, B. Fritzsche, B. Kirstein, C.Madler, J. J. Jaftha, D.B. Janse van Rensburg, P. Junghanns, R. Kaiser, J. Nemcova, M. Petreczky, J.H. van Schuppen, L. Plevnik, P. Semrl, A. Sakhnovich, F.-O. Speck, S. Sremac, H.J. Woerdeman, H. Wolkowicz and N. Vasilevski.

Thepresentbookdealswithvarioustypesoffactorizationproblemsformatrixand operator functions. The problems appear in di?erent areasof mathematics and its applications. A uni?ed approach to treat them is developed. The main theorems yield explicit necessaryand su?cient conditions for the factorizations to exist and explicit formulas for the corresponding factors. Stability of the factors relative to a small perturbation of the original function is also studied in this book. The unifying theory developed in the book is based on a geometric approach which has its origins in di?erent ?elds. A number of initial steps can be found in: (1) the theory of non-selfadjoint operators, where the study of invariant s- spaces of an operator is related to factorization of the characteristic matrix or operator function of the operator involved, (2) mathematical systems theory and electrical network theory, where a cascade decomposition of an input-output system or a network is related to a fact- ization of the associated transfer function, and (3) thefactorizationtheoryofmatrixpolynomialsintermsofinvariantsubspaces of a corresponding linearization. In all three cases a state space representation of the function to be factored is used, and the factors are expressed in state space form too. We call this approach the state space method. It hasa largenumber of applications.For instance, besides the areasreferred to above, Wiener-Hopf factorizations of some classes of symbols can also be treated by the state space method.

This book is dedicated to Israel Gohberg on occasion of his 80th birthday on August 23, 2008. It is an expression of esteem and friendship for a great mathematician, a remarkable person and an inspiring colleague. The book contains reflections by Gohberg himself on his own mathematical activities and those of others. It also includes contributions of colleagues and co-workers, both from his time in the Soviet Union and from when he lived and worked in the West. The contributions in question are not mathematical research papers but focus on the man Israel Gohberg and are intended for a wide audience. To be found are letters, speeches, laudatios and reminiscences which, together, present an attractive picture of the way in which Israel Gohberg in the past four to five decades influenced the lives of many mathematicians. Biographical material such as a curriculum vitae, a list of publications, a list of Ph.D. students and information about honorary doctoral degrees is also included.