Holography of Geodesic Flows, Harmonizing Metrics, and Billiards' Dynamics (original) (raw)

Geodesic flows in manifolds of nonpositive curvature

Smooth Ergodic Theory and Its Applications, 2001

Introduction-a quick historical survey of geodesic flows on negatively curved spaces. II. Preliminaries on Riemannian manifolds A. Riemannian metric and Riemannian volume element B. Levi Civita connection and covariant differentiation along curves C. Parallel translation of vectors along curves D. Curvature E. Geodesics and geodesic flow F. Riemannian exponential map and Jacobi vector fields G. Isometries and local isometries H. Geometry of the tangent bundle with the Sasaki metric III. Manifolds of nonpositive sectional curvature A. Definition of nonpositive curvature by triangle comparisons B. Growth of Jacobi vector fields C. The Riemannian exponential map is a covering map. Theorem of Cartan-Hadamard. D. Examples : Riemannian symmetric spaces E. Convexity properties and the Cartan Fixed Point Theorem F. Fundamental group of a nonpositively curved manifold. G. Rank of a nonpositively curved manifold IV. Sphere at infinity of a simply connected manifold of nonpositive sectional curvature A. Asymptotic geodesics and cone topology for M (∞) B. Busemann functions and horospheres _______________________________________ Supported in part by NSF Grant DMS-9625452 2 C. Extension of isometries to homeomorphisms of the sphere at infinity. D. Relating the action of the geodesic flow of M on T 1 M to the action of π 1 (M) on M (∞) V. Measures on the sphere at infinity A. Harmonic measures {ν p : p ∈ M } B. Patterson-Sullivan measures {µ p : p ∈ M } C. Lebesgue measures {λ p : p ∈ M } D. Barycenter map for probability measures. VI. Anosov foliations in the unit tangent bundle T 1 M A. Stable and unstable Jacobi vector fields. B. The stable and unstable foliations E s and E u in T(T 1 M) C. The strong stable and strong unstable foliations E ss and E uu in T(T 1 M). D. Conditions for the foliations E ss and E uu to be Anosov. VII. Some outstanding problems of geometry and dynamics A. The Katok entropy conjecture B. Smoothness of Anosov foliations and Riemannian symmetric spaces C. The geodesic conjugacy problem D. Harmonic and asymptotically harmonic spaces E. Early partial solutions. VIII. The work of Besson-Courtois-Gallot A. Statement of the main result. B. Corollaries of the main result. C. Sketch of the proof of the main result. IX. References I.

Spaces of pseudo-Riemannian geodesics and pseudo-Euclidean billiards

arXiv: Differential Geometry, 2006

Many classical facts in Riemannian geometry have their pseudo-Riemannian analogs. For instance, the spaces of space-like and time-like geodesics on a pseudo-Riemannian manifold have natural symplectic structures (just like in the Riemannian case), while the space of light-like geodesics has a natural contact structure. We discuss the geometry of these structures in detail, as well as introduce and study pseudo-Euclidean billiards. In particular, we prove pseudo-Euclidean analogs of the Jacobi-Chasles theorems and show the integrability of the billiard in the ellipsoid and the geodesic flow on the ellipsoid in a pseudo-Euclidean space.

Perturbations of geodesic flows on surface of constant negative curvature and their mixing properties

1984

We consider one parameter analytic hamiltonian perturbations of the geodesic flows on surfaces of constant negative curvature. We find two different necessary and sufficient conditions for the canonical equivalence of the perturbed flows and the non-perturbed ones. One condition says that the "Hamilton-Jacobi equation" (introduced in this work) for the conjugation problem should admit a solution as a formal power series (not necessarily convergent) in the perturbation parameter. The alternative condition is based on the identification of a complete set of invariants for the canonical conjugation problem. The relation with the similar problems arising in the KAM theory of the perturbations of quasi periodic hamiltonian motions is briefly discussed. As a byproduct of our analysis we obtain some results on the Livscic, Guillemin, Kazhdan equation and on the Fourier series for the SL(2, R) group. We also prove that the analytic functions on the phase space for the geodesic flow of unit speed have a mixing property (with respect to the geodesic flow and to the invariant volume measure) which is exponential with a universal exponent, independent on the particular function, equal to the curvature of the surface divided by 2. This result is contrasted with the slow mixing rates that the same functions show under the horocyclic flow: in this case we find that the decay rate is the inverse of the time ("up to logarithms").

Causal holography in application to the inverse scattering problems

Inverse Problems & Imaging, 2019

For a given smooth compact manifold M , we introduce an open class G(M) of Riemannian metrics, which we call metrics of the gradient type. For such metrics g, the geodesic flow v g on the spherical tangent bundle SM → M admits a Lyapunov function (so the v g-flow is traversing). It turns out, that metrics of the gradient type are exactly the non-trapping metrics. For every g ∈ G(M), the geodesic scattering along the boundary ∂M can be expressed in terms of the scattering map C v g : ∂ + 1 (SM) → ∂ − 1 (SM). It acts from a domain ∂ + 1 (SM) in the boundary ∂(SM) to the complementary domain ∂ − 1 (SM), both domains being diffeomorphic. We prove that, for a boundary generic metric g ∈ G(M), the map C v g allows for a reconstruction of SM and of the geodesic foliation F (v g) on it, up to a homeomorphism (often a diffeomorphism). Also, for such g, the knowledge of the scattering map C v g makes it possible to recover the homology of M , the Gromov simplicial semi-norm on it, and the fundamental group of M. Additionally, C v g allows to reconstruct the naturally stratified topological type of the space of geodesics on M. We aim to understand the constraints on (M, g), under which the scattering data allow for a reconstruction of M and the metric g on it, up to a natural action of the diffeomorphism group Diff(M, ∂M). In particular, we consider a closed Riemannian n-manifold (N, g) which is locally symmetric and of negative sectional curvature. Let M is obtained from N by removing an n-domain U , such that the metric g| M is boundary generic, of the gradient type, and the homomorphism π 1 (U) → π 1 (N) of the fundamental groups is trivial. Then we prove that the scattering map C v g| M makes it possible to recover N and the metric g on it.

Asymptotic evolution of smooth curves under geodesic flow on hyperbolic manifolds

Duke Mathematical Journal, 2009

Extending the earlier results for analytic curve segments, in this article we describe the asymptotic behaviour of evolution of a finite segment of a C n-smooth curve under the geodesic flow on the unit tangent bundle of a finite volume hyperbolic n-manifold. In particular, we show that if the curve satisfies certain natural geometric conditions, the pushforward of the parameter measure on the curve under the geodesic flow converges to the normalized canonical Riemannian measure on the tangent bundle in the limit. We also study the limits of geodesic evolution of shrinking segments. We use Ratner's classification of ergodic invariant measures for unipotent flows on homogeneous spaces of SO(n, 1), and an observation relating local growth properties of smooth curves and dynamics of linear SL(2, R)-actions.