Bounded geometry for Kleinian groups

We show that a Kleinian surface group, or hyperbolic 3-manifold with a cusp-preserving homotopy-equivalence to a surface, has bounded geometry if and only if there is an upper bound on an associated collection of coefficients that depend only on its end invariants. Bounded geometry is a positive lower bound on the lengths of closed geodesics. When the surface is a once-punctured torus, the coefficients coincide with the continued fraction coefficients associated to the ending laminations. Oblatum 31-VII-2000 & 9-V-2001?Published online: 20 July 2001     

Geodesic knots in closed hyperbolic 3-manifolds

We consider the existence of simple closed geodesics or “geodesic knots” in finite volume orientable hyperbolic 3-manifolds. Every such manifold contains at least one geodesic knot by results of Adams, Hass and Scott in (Adams et al. Bull. London Math. Soc. 31: 81–86, 1999). In (Kuhlmann Algebr. Geom. Topol. 6: 2151–2162, 2006) we showed that every cusped orientable hyperbolic 3-manifold in fact contains infinitely many geodesic knots. In this paper we consider the closed manifold case, and show that if a closed orientable hyperbolic 3-manifold satisfies certain geometric and arithmetic conditions, then it contains infinitely many geodesic knots. The conditions on the manifold can be checked computationally, and have been verified for many manifolds in the Hodgson-Weeks census of closed hyperbolic 3-manifolds. Our proof is constructive, and the infinite family of geodesic knots spiral around a short simple closed geodesic in the manifold.      

Length Bounds on Curves Arising from Tight Geodesics

Let M be a complete hyperbolic 3-manifold admitting a homotopy equivalence to a compact surface ∑, such that the cusps of M are in bijective correspondence with the boundary components of ∑. Suppose we realise a tight geodesic in the curve complex as a sequence of closed geodesics M. There is an upper bound on the lengths of such curves in terms of the lengths of the terminal curves and the topologicial type of ∑. We give proofs of these and related bounds. Similar bounds have been proven by Minsky using the sophisticated machinery of hierarchies. Such bounds feature in the work of Brock, Canary and Minsky towards the ending lamination conjecture, and can also be used to study the action of the mapping class group on the curve complex. Received: January 2006, Revision: March 2007, Accepted: July 2007     

On the existence of closed timelike geodesics in compact spacetimes

In [19], Tipler has shown that a compact spacetime having a regular globally hyperbolic covering space with compact Cauchy surfaces necessarily contains a closed timelike geodesic. The restriction to compact spacetimes with just regular globally hyperbolic coverings (i.e., the Cauchy surfaces are not required to be compact) is still an open question. Here, we shall answer this question negatively by providing examples of compact flat Lorentz space forms without closed timelike geodesics, and shall give some criterion for the existence of such geodesics. More generally, we will show that in a compact spacetime having a regular globally hyperbolic covering, each free timelike homotopy class determined by a central deck transformation must contain a closed timelike geodesic. Whether or not a compact flat spacetime contains closed nonspacelike geodesics is, as far as we know, an open question. We shall answer this question affirmatively. We shall also introduce the notion of timelike injectivity radius for a spacetime relative to a free timelike homotopy class and shall show that it is finite whenever the corresponding deck transformation is central. Received: 9 November 1999; in final form: 19 September 2000 / Published online: 25 June 2001     

A Note on Surfaces Bounding Hyperbolic 3-Manifolds

We consider the problem of whether a given hyperbolic surface occurs as the totally geodesic boundary of a compact hyperbolic 3-manifold (as some or as the only boundary component). We discuss some explicit examples of hyperbolic surfaces, in particular the surface associated to the small stellated dodecahedron (one of the four Kepler-Poinsot polyhedra) which is the boundary of a hyperbolic icosahedral 3-manifold.     

A Note on Surfaces Bounding Hyperbolic 3-Manifolds

We consider the problem of whether a given hyperbolic surface occurs as the totally geodesic boundary of a compact hyperbolic 3-manifold (as some or as the only boundary component). We discuss some explicit examples of hyperbolic surfaces, in particular the surface associated to the small stellated dodecahedron (one of the four Kepler-Poinsot polyhedra) which is the boundary of a hyperbolic icosahedral 3-manifold.     

On lengths of filling closed geodesics of hyperbolic punctured Riemann spheres

Let S be a Riemann sphere with n ≥ 4 points deleted. In this article we investigate certain filling closed geodesics of S and give quantitative common lower bounds for the hyperbolic lengths of those geodesics with respect to any hyperbolic structure on S (© 2009 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

The Cannon–Thurston map for punctured-surface groups

Let Γ be the fundamental group of a compact surface group with non-empty boundary. We suppose that Γ admits a properly discontinuous strictly type preserving action on hyperbolic 3-space such that there is a positive lower bound on the translation lengths of loxodromic elements. We describe the Cannon–Thurston map in this case. In particular, we show that there is a continuous equivariant map of the circle to the boundary of hyperbolic 3-space, where the action on the circle is obtained by taking any finite-area complete hyperbolic structure on the surface, and lifting to the boundary of hyperbolic 2-space. We deduce that the limit set is locally connected, hence a dentrite in the singly degenerate case. Moreover, we show that the Cannon–Thurston map can be described topologically as the quotient of the circle by the equivalence relations arising from the ends of the quotient 3-manifold. For closed surface bundles over the circle, this was obtained by Cannon and Thurston. Some generalisations and variations have been obtained by Minsky, Mitra, Alperin, Dicks, Porti, McMullen and Cannon. We deduce that a finitely generated kleinian group with a positive lower bound on the translation lengths of loxodromics has a locally connected limit set assuming it is connected.     

Margulis numbers for Haken manifolds

For every closed orientable hyperbolic Haken 3-manifold and, more generally, for any orientable hyperbolic 3-manifold M which is homeomorphic to the interior of a Haken manifold, the number 0.286 is a Margulis number. If H ₁(M;ℚ) ≠ 0, or if M is closed and contains a semi-fiber, then 0.292 is a Margulis number for M.     

A conjecture on the lengths of filling pairs

Geometriae Dedicata - A pair $$(\alpha , \beta )$$ of simple closed geodesics on a closed and oriented hyperbolic surface $$M_g$$ of genus g is called a filling pair if the complementary components...     

McShane’s identity,using elliptic elements

We introduce a new method to establish McShane’s Identity. Elliptic elements of order two in the Fuchsian group uniformizing the quotient of a fixed once-punctured hyperbolic torus act so as to exclude points as being highest points of geodesics. The highest points of simple closed geodesics are already given as the appropriate complement of the regions excluded by those elements of order two that factor hyperbolic elements whose axis projects to be simple. The widths of the intersection with an appropriate horocycle of the excluded regions sum to give McShane’s value of 1/2. The remaining points on the horocycle are highest points of simple open geodesics, we show that this set has zero Hausdorff dimension.      

Isospectral finiteness on hyperbolic 3‐manifolds

In this paper we show that for a given set of lengths of closed geodesics, there are only finitely many convex‐cocompact, hyperbolic 3‐manifolds with incompressible boundary, up to orientation‐preserving isometries. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

On a multiplicity one property for the length spectra of even dimensional compact hyperbolic spaces

We prove a multiplicity one theorem for the length spectrum of compact even dimensional hyperbolic spaces, i.e., if all but finitely many closed geodesics for two compact even dimensional hyperbolic spaces have the same length, then all closed geodesics have the same length.     

Effective Circle Count for Apollonian Packings and Closed Horospheres

The main result of this paper is an effective count for Apollonian circle packings that are either bounded or contain two parallel lines. We obtain this by proving an effective equidistribution of closed horospheres in the unit tangent bundle of a geometrically finite hyperbolic 3-manifold, whose fundamental group has critical exponent bigger than 1. We also discuss applications to affine sieves. Analogous results for surfaces are treated as well.     

Lengths of geodesics on non-orientable hyperbolic surfaces

We give an identity involving sums of functions of lengths of simple closed geodesics, known as a McShane identity, on any non-orientable hyperbolic surface with boundary which generalises Mirzakhani’s identities on orientable hyperbolic surfaces with boundary.      

Maxwell Strata and Cut Locus in the Sub-Riemannian Problem on the Engel Group

We consider the nilpotent left-invariant sub-Riemannian structure on the Engel group. This structure gives a fundamental local approximation of a generic rank 2 sub-Riemannian structure on a 4-manifold near a generic point (in particular, of the kinematic models of a car with a trailer). On the other hand, this is the simplest sub-Riemannian structure of step three. We describe the global structure of the cut locus (the set of points where geodesics lose their global optimality), the Maxwell set (the set of points that admit more than one minimizer), and the intersection of the cut locus with the caustic (the set of conjugate points along all geodesics). The group of symmetries of the cut locus is described: it is generated by a one-parameter group of dilations R₊ and a discrete group of reflections Z₂ × Z₂ × Z₂. The cut locus admits a stratification with 6 three-dimensional strata, 12 two-dimensional strata, and 2 one-dimensional strata. Three-dimensional strata of the cut locus are Maxwell strata of multiplicity 2 (for each point there are 2 minimizers). Two-dimensional strata of the cut locus consist of conjugate points. Finally, one-dimensional strata are Maxwell strata of infinite multiplicity, they consist of conjugate points as well. Projections of sub-Riemannian geodesics to the 2-dimensional plane of the distribution are Euler elasticae. For each point of the cut locus, we describe the Euler elasticae corresponding to minimizers coming to this point. Finally, we describe the structure of the optimal synthesis, i. e., the set of minimizers for each terminal point in the Engel group.     

Consequences of contractible geodesics on surfaces

The geodesic flow of any Riemannian metric on a geodesically convex surface of negative Euler characteristic is shown to be semi-equivalent to that of any hyperbolic metric on a homeomorphic surface for which the boundary (if any) is geodesic. This has interesting corollaries. For example, it implies chaotic dynamics for geodesic flows on a torus with a simple contractible closed geodesic, and for geodesic flows on a sphere with three simple closed geodesics bounding disjoint discs.

     

The Carathéodory topology for multiply connected domains I

We consider the convergence of pointed multiply connected domains in the Carathéodory topology. Behaviour in the limit is largely determined by the properties of the simple closed hyperbolic geodesics which separate components of the complement. Of particular importance are those whose hyperbolic length is as short as possible which we call meridians of the domain. We prove continuity results on convergence of such geodesics for sequences of pointed hyperbolic domains which converge in the Carathéodory topology to another pointed hyperbolic domain. Using these we describe an equivalent condition to Carathéodory convergence which is formulated in terms of Riemann mappings to standard slit domains.     

Hyperbolic spatial graphs in 3-manifolds

For any closed connected orientable 3-manifold M, we present a method for constructing infinitely many hyperbolic spatial embeddings of a given finite graph with no vertex of degree less than two from hyperbolic spatial graphs in S³ via the Heegaard splitting theory. These spatial embeddings are adjustable so as to take cycle subgraphs into specified homotopy classes of loops in M.     

Thick Surfaces in Hyperbolic 3-Manifolds

We show that every closed, virtually fibered hyperbolic 3-manifold contains immersed, quasi-Fuchsian.