Connecting rational homotopy type singularities

Let N be a compact simply connected smooth Riemannian manifold and, for p ∈ {2,3,...}, W ^1,p (R ^p+1, N) be the Sobolev space of measurable maps from R ^p+1 into N whose gradients are in L ^p . The restriction of u to almost every p-dimensional sphere S in R ^p+1 is in W ^1,p (S, N) and defines an homotopy class in π _p (N) (White 1988). Evaluating a fixed element z of Hom(π _p (N), R) on this homotopy class thus gives a real number Φ _z,u (S). The main result of the paper is that any W ^1,p -weakly convergent limit u of a sequence of smooth maps in C ^∞(R ^p+1, N), Φ _z,u has a rectifiable Poincaré dual . Here Γ is a a countable union of C ¹ curves in R ^p+1 with Hausdorff -measurable orientation and density function θ: Γ→R. The intersection number between and S evaluates Φ _z,u (S), for almost every p-sphere S. Moreover, we exhibit a non-negative integer n _z , depending only on homotopy operation z, such that even though the mass may be infinite. We also provide cases of N, p and z for which this rational power p/(p + n _z ) is optimal. The construction of this Poincaré dual is based on 1-dimensional “bubbling” described by the notion of “scans” which was introduced in Hardt and Rivière (2003). We also describe how to generalize these results to R ^m for any m ⩾ p + 1, in which case the bubbling is described by an (m–p)-rectifiable set with orientation and density function determined by restrictions of the mappings to almost every oriented Euclidean p-sphere.