Positive semigroups and abstract Lyapunov equations

Abstract: We consider abstract equations of the form Ax=-z on a locally convex space, where A generates a positive semigroup and z is a positive element. This is an abstract version of the operator Lyapunov equation A*P+PA=-Q from control theory. It is proved that under suitable assumptions existence of a positive solution implies that -A has a positive inverse, and the generated semigroup is asymptotically stable. We do not require that z is an order unit, or that the space contains any order units. As an application, we generalize Wonham's theorem on the operator Lyapunov equations with detectable right hand sides to reflexive Banach spaces.