A Counterexample to Horn's Coincidence Conjecture

Abstract

Horn conjectured that whenever $K$ is a nonempty compact convex subset of a Banach space and $F,G:K\to K$ are continuous commuting maps, there exists $x\in K$ such that $F(x)=G(x)$. We give a counterexample in a separable Hilbert space. The construction uses an exactly commuting ladder of coincidence-free maps between finite trees, due to Oversteegen and Rogers.