Nonlinear Analysis 70 (2009) 30723075

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Nonlinear Analysis
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/na

On generalized convexity in Asplund spaces

M. Soleimani-damaneh
School of Mathematics, Statistics and Computer Science, University College of Science, University of Tehran, Enghelab Avenue, Tehran, Iran

article

a b s t r a c t

info

Article history:
Received 7 July 2007
Accepted 10 April 2008

In this paper some properties of nonsmooth quasiconvex and pseudoconvex functions in

weakly compactly generated Asplund spaces are proved.
2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Weakly compactly generated space
Asplund space
Limiting subdifferential
Quasiconvex
Pseudoconvex

1. Introduction
In the recent years, many scholars have characterized the different classes of generalized convex functions and have
addressed their important properties (see [13]). Indeed, convex and generalized convex functions play a crucial role
in some pure and applied fields of mathematics (see, e.g., [1,46,11]). Also, one of the most characteristic features of
modern variational analysis is the intrinsic presence of nonsmoothness, i.e., the necessity to deal with nondifferentiable
functions, sets with nonsmooth boundaries, and set-valued mappings. The notion of generalized differentiation plays a
fundamental role in modern variational analysis [411]. In this paper we deal with the concept of nonsmooth quasiconvex
and pseudoconvex functions in weakly compactly generated Asplund spaces and provide some of their properties. The study
has been carried out using the properties of limiting subdifferentials. Indeed, this paper gives generalizations of the results
established in [10].
2. Preliminaries
Throughout this paper, X is a weakly compactly generated (WCG) Asplund space, X denotes the topological dual of X
and h. , .i is the duality pairing. X is an Asplund space, if it is a Banach space where every convex continuous function is
generically Frchet differentiable. Recall that f : X Y is Frchet differentiable at x if there exists a linear continuous
operator f (x ) : X Y , called the Frchet derivative of f at x , such that
lim

xx

f (x) f (x ) f (x )(x x )

kx x k

= 0.

Let be a nonempty subset of X . Given x and  > 0, the set of -normals to at x is defined by

hx , u xi

b
N (x; ) = x X : lim sup
 .

ku x k

u x

If x 6 , we put b
N (x; ) = for all  0.
Tel.: +98 21 61112613; fax: +98 21 66412178.
E-mail address: soleimani@khayam.ut.ac.ir.
0362-546X/$ see front matter 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.na.2008.04.008

M. Soleimani-damaneh / Nonlinear Analysis 70 (2009) 30723075

3073
w

Let x . Then x X is a limiting normal to at x if there are sequences k 0, xk x , and xk x such that
xk b
Nk (xk ; ) for all k N. The collection of such normals
N(x ; ) = lim sup b
N ( x ; )

x x
0

is the limiting normal cone to at x . Put N (x ; ) = for x 6 . Note that the symbol u x means u x with u .

The symbol stands for convergence in weak topology, and N denotes the set of all natural numbers. See text book [8]
for more details about the properties of above-defined normal sets.
Considering the extended-real-valued function : X R = [, +], we say that is proper if (x) > for all
x X and its domain, dom = {x X : (x) < }, is nonempty. The epigraph of is defined as, epi = {(x, a) X R :
(x) a}. Considering a point x X with |(x )| < , the set

(x ) = {x X : (x , 1) N((x , (x )); epi )}

is the limiting subdifferential of at x and its elements are limiting subdifferentials of at this point. We put (x ) = if
|(x )| = . The notion of the limiting normal cone was first introduced (in finite dimensions) by Mordukhovich [7]. See [4,
711] for more details and applications. One of the classes of functions whose set of limiting subdifferentials is nonempty
is the class of locally Lipschitz (Lipschitz continuous) functions. Considering this class in the Asplund spaces, the following
result is obtained and known in nonsmooth analysis (see [8, p. 310]).
Theorem 2.1. Let be Lipschitz continuous (see [8, p. 19] for definition of Lipschitz continuity) on an open set containing [x, y].
Then

(y) (x) hx , y xi
for some c [a, b), x (c).
We close this section with definitions of quasiconvex and pseudoconvex functions. Note that Definition 2.2 is a
generalization of the concept of pseudoconvexity for differentiable functions to that for nondifferentiable ones (see [1]).
Definition 2.1. The function is said to be quasiconvex if, for each x, x0 S and each [0, 1], we have (x + (1 )x0 )
max{(x), (x0 )}. The function is said to be strictly quasiconvex if, for each x, x0 S with (x) 6= (x0 ) and each (0, 1),
we have (x + (1 )x0 ) < max{(x), (x0 )}.
Definition 2.2. The function is said to be pseudoconvex if, for each x, x0 S with hx , x x0 i 0 for some x (x0 ), we
have (x) (x0 ).
Lemma 2.1. Suppose that is a Lipschitz continuous strictly quasiconvex function, then is quasiconvex.
3. Main results
This section contains the main results of the paper. Theorems 3.1 and 3.2 give the necessary and sufficient conditions
for locally Lipschitz quasiconvex functions in weakly compactly generated Asplund spaces, respectively. Theorem 3.3 and
Corollary 3.1 provide some relations between the (strictly) quasiconvex and pseudoconvex functions.
Theorem 3.1. Let be Lipschitz continuous and quasiconvex on S, an open convex subset of X . Then for each x, x0 S with
(x) (x0 ) we have hx , x x0 i 0 for some x (x0 ).
Proof. Suppose that x, x0 S and (x) (x0 ). By quasiconvexity, we have

(x0 ) (x + (1 )x0 ) 0
for each (0, 1). By assumption of the theorem, is Lipschitz continuous on an open set containing [x + (1 )x0 , x0 ]
and hence by Theorem 2.1 there exists a c [x + (1 )x0 , x0 ) and an x (c ) such that
0 (x0 ) (x + (1 )x0 ) hx , x0 xi,
and hence

hx , x0 xi 0.
Since is locally Lipschitz, the sequence {x } is bounded due to Proposition 1.85 in [8]. Hence when 0, remembering
that X is weakly compactly generated Asplund, {x } has a subsequence that converges weak to some x (x0 ), because
limo c = x0 .
Therefore

hx , x0 xi = lim hx , x0 xi 0,
0

and the proof is complete.

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3074

Theorem 3.2. Suppose that is Lipschitz continuous on S, an open convex subset of X , and also for each x, x0 S with (x) (x0 )
we have hx , x x0 i 0 for all x (x0 ). Then is quasiconvex.
Proof. By contradiction, suppose that is not quasiconvex, then there exist x, x0 S and a (0, 1) such that (x) (x0 )
and

(x + (1 )x0 ) > (x0 ).

Setting x = x + (1 )x0 , we get (x ) > (x0 ). Since is locally Lipschitz, it is continuous on S and hence there exists a
(0, 1) such that

(x + (1 )x0 ) > (x0 )

for each [, 1] and

(x ) > (x + (1 )x0 ).
[, 1)
Now regarding Theorem 2.1 and in a similar way to the proof of Theorem 3.1 it can be shown that there exists a
and a point x such that
x + (1 )
x0 ,
x =
and
0 < (x ) (x + (1 )x0 ) (1 )hx , x x0 i
for some x (x ), which gives hx , x x0 i > 0 for some x (x ). This implies that hx , x x0 i > 0 for some x (x ).
x0 . Regarding the
On the other hand, we have (x ) > (x0 ) (x) and there exists a (0, 1) such that x = x + (1 )
assumption of the theorem we get hx , x x i 0 which gives hx , x x0 i 0. So far, we have obtained
0 < hx , x x0 i 0
which is an obvious contradiction and completes the proof.

Theorem 3.3. Suppose that is a pseudoconvex Lipschitz continuous function on S, an open convex subset of X , then is strictly
quasiconvex.
Proof. By contradiction, suppose that is not strictly quasiconvex, then there exist x, x0 S and a (0, 1) such that
(x) < (x0 ) and

(x + (1 )x0 ) (x0 ).
Setting x = x + (1 )x0 , we get (x ) (x0 ) > (x). By pseudoconvexity assumption we have

hx , x x i < 0
for each x (x ). This implies that

hx , x0 x i > 0
for each x (x ), and thus we have (x ) (x0 ) by pseudoconvexity assumption. Therefore (x ) = (x0 ).
On the other hand, since S is open and is locally Lipschitz on S, there exists a 0 < < 1 such that B (x ) S and is
Lipschitz continuous on an open set containing [x + (x0 x ), x ], for each (0, ]. Now, by Theorem 2.1, there exists a
z [x + (x0 x ), x ) such that

(x ) (x + (x0 x )) hx , x x0 i,
for some x (z ). Since is locally Lipschitz, the sequence {x } is bounded due to Proposition 1.85 in [8]. Hence when
0, remembering that X is weakly compactly generated Asplund, {x } has a subsequence that converges weak to some
x (x ), because limo z = x . This implies that

(x ) (x + (x0 x ))
hx , x x0 i < 0.
0

Thus there exists a vector x and a (0, 1) such that

lim

S 3 x =

x0 + (1 )x

and (x ) > (x ) = (x0 ). Hence, using the pseudoconvexity assumption we get hx , x0 x i < 0 and hx , x x i < 0 for each
x (x ), while

hx , x x i =

hx , x0 x i
> 0.
1

This is an obvious contradiction and completes the proof.

M. Soleimani-damaneh / Nonlinear Analysis 70 (2009) 30723075

3075

By combining Lemma 2.1 and Theorem 3.3, we have:

Corollary 3.1. If is a pseudoconvex Lipschitz continuous function on S, then is quasiconvex.
Acknowledgment
The author would like to express his gratitude to the anonymous referee for helpful comments on the first versions of
this paper.
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[4]
[5]
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[8]
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[10]
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