Szlenk indices of convex hulls

Abstract: We study the general measures of non-compactness defined on subsets of a dual Banach space, their associated derivations and their $\omega$-iterates. We introduce the notions of convexifiable and sublinear measure of non-compactness and investigate the properties of its associated fragment and slice derivations. We apply our results to the Kuratowski measure of non-compactness and to the study of the Szlenk index of a Banach space. As a consequence, we obtain that the Szlenk index and the convex Szlenk index of a separable Banach space are always equal. We also give, for any countable ordinal $\alpha$, a characterization of the Banach spaces with Szlenk index bounded by $\omega^{\alpha+1}$ in terms of the existence of an equivalent renorming. This extends a result by Knaust, Odell and Schlumprecht on Banach spaces with Szlenk index equal to $\omega$.