General Topology – Locally Compact Stone-Weierstrass Theorem

analysisbanach-algebrasfunctional-analysisgeneral-topology

STATEMENT: Let $X$ be a locally compact Hausdorff space, and let $A = C_∞(X)$ be the algebra of continuous real-valued functions on $X$ that vanish at infinity, as above, equipped with the supremum norm. Let $B$ be a subalgebra of A that sep- arates the points of $X$ and is such that for every $x∈X$ there is an $f ∈B$ such that $f(x)\neq 0.$ Prove that $B$ is norm-dense in $A.$

QUESTION: So far I have show that I can isometrically embed $B$ into $C(\tilde{X})$, through the map $F$, via the natural extension. I then took the direct sum of $B\oplus \left\{g\right\}$ to satisfy stone-weirstrass theorem. Here is where I am stuck. I don't know how to conclude that this implies that $B$ is norm dense. Some hints would be appreciated.

Best Answer

If $f \in C_\infty(X)$ (that is, $f$ has a continuous extension $\tilde{f}$ to $\tilde{X}$ with $\tilde{f}(\infty) = 0$), and you have a

$$h = b + c\cdot g \in B \oplus \{g\}$$

with $b\in B,\, c \in \mathbb{R}$, and

$$\lVert f - h\rVert_\infty \leqslant \varepsilon,$$

that tells you something about $c$ which in turn yields a useful estimate for

$$\lVert f-b\rVert_\infty.$$

Namely,

$$\varepsilon \geqslant \lVert f-h\rVert_\infty \geqslant \lvert f(\infty) - h(\infty)\rvert = \lvert f(\infty) - b(\infty) - c\cdot g(\infty)\rvert = \lvert c\rvert,$$

and hence

$$\lVert f - b\rVert_\infty = \lVert f - h + c\cdot g\rVert_\infty \leqslant \lVert f-h\rVert_\infty + \lvert c\rvert\cdot \lVert g\rVert_\infty \leqslant \varepsilon + \varepsilon.$$

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