Structure for Regular Inclusions

Abstract

We study pairs (C,D) of unital C*-algebras where D is a regular abelian C*-subalgebra of C. When D is a MASA in C, we prove the existence and uniqueness of a completely positive unital map E of C into the injective envelope I(D) of D whose restriction to D is the identity on D. We show that the left kernel of E, L(C,D), is the unique closed two-sided ideal of C maximal with respect to having trivial intersection with D. When L(C,D)=0, we show the MASA D norms C. We apply these results to extend existing results in the literature on isometric isomorphisms of norm-closed subalgebras which lie between D and C. The map E can be used as a substitute for a conditional expectation in the construction of coordinates for C relative to D. Coordinate constructions of Kumjian and Renault may partially be extended to settings where no conditional expectation exists. As an example, we consider the situation in which C is the reduced crossed product of a unital abelian C*-algebra D by an arbitrary discrete group acting as automorphisms of D. We characterize when the relative commutant, D', of D in C is abelian in terms of the dynamics of the action of the group and show that when D' is abelian, L(C,D')=0. This setting produces examples where no conditional expectation of C onto D' exists. When C is separable, and D is a regular MASA in C, we show the set of pure states on D with unique state extensions to C is dense in D. We introduce a new class of well behaved state extensions, the compatible states; we identify compatible states when D is a MASA in C in terms of groups constructed from local dynamics near a pure state on D. A particularly nice class of regular inclusions is the class of C*-diagonals. We show that the pair (C,D) regularly embeds into a C*-diagonal precisely when the intersection of the left kernels of the compatible states is trivial.