Relatively spectral morphisms and applications to K-theory

Spectral morphisms between Banach algebras are useful for comparing their K-theory and their “noncommutative dimensions” as expressed by various notions of stable ranks. In practice, one often encounters situations where the spectral information is only known over a dense subalgebra. We investigate such relatively spectral morphisms. We prove a relative version of the Density Theorem regarding isomorphism in K-theory. We also solve Swan’s problem for the connected stable rank, in fact for an entire hierarchy of higher connected stable ranks that we introduce. © 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.