We study the “geometric Ricci curvature lower bound”, introduced previously by Junge, Li and LaRacuente, for a variety of examples including group von Neumann algebras, free orthogonal quantum groups [Formula: see text], [Formula: see text]-deformed Gaussian algebras and quantum tori. In particular, we show that Laplace operator on [Formula: see text] admits a factorization through the Laplace–Beltrami operator on the classical orthogonal group, which establishes the first connection between these two operators. Based on a non-negative curvature condition, we obtain the completely bounded version of the modified log-Sobolev inequalities for the corresponding quantum Markov semigroups on the examples mentioned above. We also prove that the “geometric Ricci curvature lower bound” is stable under tensor products and amalgamated free products. As an application, we obtain a sharp Ricci curvature lower bound for word-length semigroups on free group factors.
Amalgamated free product rigidity for group von Neumann algebras