Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 November 2011
A Banach algebra A is said to be topologically nilpotent if sup {‖x1x2…xn‖1/n: xi ∈ A, ‖xi‖ ≦ 1 (1 ≦ i ≦ n)} tends to zero as n → ∞. A Banach algebra A is uniformly topologically nil if sup {‖xn‖ 1/n: x ∈ A, ‖x‖ ≦ 1} tends to zero as n → ∞. These notions are equivalent for commutative algebras and a topological version of the Nagata-Higman Theorem gives a partial result for the non-commutative case. Topologically nilpotent algebras have a strong non-factorisation property and this yields theorems of the type “factorisation implies the existence of arbitrarily slowly decreasing powers”. Extensions of topologically nilpotent algebras by topologically nilpotent algebras are topologically nilpotent.