Operators on anti-dual pairs: Lebesgue decomposition of positive operators

Abstract

In this paper we introduce and study absolute continuity and singularity of positive operators acting on anti-dual pairs. We establish a general theorem that can be considered as a common generalization of various earlier Lebesgue-type decompositions. Different algebraic and topological characterizations of absolute continuity and singularity are supplied and also a complete description of uniqueness of the decomposition is provided. We apply the developed decomposition theory to some concrete objects including Hilbert space operators, Hermitian forms, representable functionals, and additive set functions.