Sunrise strategy for the continuity of maximal operators

Abstract: In this paper we address the $W^{1,1}$-continuity of several maximal operators at the gradient level. A key idea in our global strategy is the decomposition of a maximal operator, with the absence of strict local maxima in the disconnecting set, into "lateral" maximal operators with good monotonicity and convergence properties. This construction is inspired in the classical sunrise lemma in harmonic analysis. A model case for our sunrise strategy considers the uncentered Hardy-Littlewood maximal operator $\widetilde{M}$ acting on $W^{1,1}_{\rm rad}(\mathbb{R}^d)$, the subspace of $W^{1,1}(\mathbb{R}^d)$ consisting of radial functions. In dimension $d\geq 2$ it was recently established by H. Luiro that the map $f \mapsto \nabla \widetilde{M} f$ is bounded from $W^{1,1}_{\rm rad}(\mathbb{R}^d)$ to $L^1(\mathbb{R}^d)$, and we show that such map is also continuous. Further applications of the sunrise strategy in connection with the $W^{1,1}$-continuity problem include non-tangential maximal operators on $\mathbb{R}^d$ acting on radial functions when $d\geq 2$ and general functions when $d=1$, and the uncentered Hardy-Littlewood maximal operator on the sphere $\mathbb{S}^d$ acting on polar functions when $d\geq 2$ and general functions when $d=1$.