Compressions of the Shift on the Bidisk and their Numerical Ranges

Abstract

We consider two-variable model spaces associated to rational inner functions $\Theta$ on the bidisk, which always possess canonical $z_2$-invariant subspaces $\mathcal{S}_2.$ A particularly interesting compression of the shift is the compression of multiplication by $z_1$ to $\mathcal{S}_2$, namely $ S^1_{\Theta}:= P_{\mathcal{S}_2} M_{z_1} |_{\mathcal{S}_2}$. We show that these compressed shifts are unitarily equivalent to matrix-valued Toeplitz operators with well-behaved symbols and characterize their numerical ranges and radii. We later specialize to particularly simple rational inner functions and study the geometry of the associated numerical ranges, find formulas for the boundaries, answer the zero inclusion question, and determine whether the numerical ranges are ever circular.