Real Analysis HW 4 Solutions

Problem 4: Suppose f is a real-valued function on R such that f 1 (c) is measurable for

each number c. Is f necessarily measurable?
Solution: No. Let V be a non-measurable subset of (0, 1) and consider the function f (x) =
ex (2V 1). Note that f > 0 on V and f 0 on R V . Since f is one-to-one we
also have that f 1 (c) is either empty or a singleton and therefore measurable. However, by
construction we have f 1 ((0, )) = {x : f (x) > 0} = V . Therefore f is not measurable. 
Problem 9: Let {fn } be a sequence of measurable functions defined on a measurable set
E. Define E0 to be the set of points x in E at which {fn (x)} converges. Is the set E0
measurable.
Solution: Note that we may write E0 as
E0 = {x : {fn (x)} is Cauchy} =

[
\

{x : |fn (x) fm (x)| < 1/k}.

k=1 N =1 n,mN

Therefore E0 is measurable since {x : |fn (x) fm (x)| < 1/k} is.

Problem 13: A real valued measurable function is said to be semisimple provided it takes
only a countable number of values. Let f be any measurable function E. Show that there is
a sequence of semisimple functions {fn } on E that converge to f uniformly on E.
Solution: Suppose for each integer m 1 we split up R into intervals {In,m }nZ of size 1/m
given by In,m = [(n1)/m, n/m), which in turn partitions E into measurable sets {En,m }nZ
given by En,m = f 1 (In,m ). Define the semisimple function
m =

Xn1
nZ

En,m

It follows that for any integer m 1, if we fix x E there is an n Z such that m (x) =
(n 1)/m f (x) < n/m and therefore x En,m . This means that for each x E and
m 1 we may write f (x) m (x) < 1/m. Therefore if we let  > 0, then for any n > 1/,
f n = |f n | < 1/n <  on E,
and so n f uniformly on E.


1

Problem 22: (Dinis Theorem) Let {fn } be an increasing sequence of continuous functions
on [a, b] which converge pointwise on [a, b] to the continuous function f on [a, b]. Show that
the convergence is uniform on [a, b].
Solution: Let  > 0, and define En = {x [a, b] : f (x) fn (x) < }. Note that since
fSn and f are continuous and converge pointwise, that En are relatively open in [a, b] and

n=1 En = [a, b]. Furthermore, since fn is an increasing sequence then En En+1 . It follows
by Heine Borel that [a, b] is compact and therefore there exists a sub-cover {Enj }N
j=1 of [a, b].
However since En are ascending,
[a, b] =

N
[

Enj = En ,

j=1

where n = maxj {nj }. Therefore the convergence is uniform.

Problem 25: Suppose f is a function that is continuous on a closed set F of real numbers.
Show that f has a continuous extension to all of R. This is a special case of the forthcoming
Tietze Extension Theorem.
Solution: We may assume F is non-empty. Since F is closed we see that R F is open,
and
S therefore may be written as a countable disjoint union of open intervals R F =
k=1 (ak , bk ). On each of these intervals, we extend f continuously to f as a linear function
in the following way: suppose x (ak , bk ), then
if ak , bk are finite we define
f (bk ) f (ak )
(x ak ) + f (ak ),
f(x) =
b k ak
if bk = define
if ak = define

f(x) = f (ak ),
f(x) = f (bk ).

Clearly the extended f is now continuous on R since it matches f on the endpoints of the
intervals and is therefore continuous at every point.

Problem 27: Show that the conclusion of Egoroffs Theorem can fail if we drop the assumption that the domain has finite measure.
Solution: Consider sequence fn (x) = [n,) (x). Clearly fn 0 pointwise on R. Suppose
that there existed a set F such that m(R F ) <  and fn 0 uniformly on F . Since fn
is an indicator function, this means we can find an N such that fN = 0 on F . This implies
F (, N ) and so [N, ) R F , giving
m([N, )) m(R F ) < ,
2

which is a contradiction.

Problem 29: Prove the extension of Lusins Theorem to the case that E has infinite
measure.
Solution: Suppose f : E R is measurable. We split up E into disjoint finite measure
sets {En }nZ given by En = E [n, n + 1). By Lusins theorem for finite measure sets,
we know that there exist closed sets Fn and continuous
S functions gn : Fn R such that
m(En Fn ) < /2|n|+1 and f = gn on Fn . Define F = kZ Fn and
g(x) =

gn (x)Fn (x).

kZ

Note that g is continuous on F .

We now claim that F is closed. To see this consider {xn } F , converging to an x E.
Since x Ek for some k, we see that for large enough N , {xn }nN belongs to Fk1 Fk
which is a closed set and therefore x Fk1 Fk F .
Since F is closed, by problem (25) we may extend g continuously to R. It now follows that
f = g on F and
!
[
X
m(E F ) = m
(En Fn ) =
m(En Fn ) < .
nZ

kZ