Conformal metrics of constant mass

We give a new interpretation of the canonical metrics associated to scalar positive locally conformally flat structures introduced in a previous paper. This allows us to extend the definition to not necessarily locally conformally flat structures in low dimensions. Received May 1, 2000 / Accepted May 9, 2000 / Published online September 14, 2000     

On a Theorem of Strobel

Received April 17, 2000 / Accepted May 9, 2000 / Published online September 14, 2000     

Regularity of quasiconvex envelopes

We prove that the quasiconvex envelope of a differentiable function which satisfies natural growth conditions at infinity is a function. Without the growth conditions the result fails in general. We also obtain results on higher regularity (in the sense of ) and similar results for other types of envelopes, including polyconvex and rank-1 convex envelopes. Received January 11, 2000/ Accepted January 14, 2000 / Published online June 28, 2000     

Families of irreducible polynomials of Gaussian periods and matrices of cyclotomic numbers

Given an odd prime we show a way to construct large families of polynomials , , where is a set of primes of the form mod and is the irreducible polynomial of the Gaussian periods of degree in . Examples of these families when are worked in detail. We also show, given an integer and a prime mod , how to represent by matrices the Gaussian periods of degree in , and how to calculate in a simple way, with the help of a computer, irreducible polynomials for elements of .

     

Asymptotic behaviour of Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity

Let be a polynomial ring over a field. For a graded -module generated in degree at most , the Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity of each of (i) its symmetric power, (ii) its torsion-free symmetric power and (iii) the integral closure of its torsion-free symmetric power is bounded above by a linear function in with leading coefficient at most . For a graded ideal of , the regularity of is given by a linear function of for all sufficiently large . The leading coefficient of this function is identified.

     

Computing roadmaps of semi-algebraic sets on a variety

We consider a semi-algebraic set defined by polynomials in variables which is contained in an algebraic variety . The variety is assumed to have real dimension the polynomial and the polynomials defining have degree at most . We present an algorithm which constructs a roadmap on . The complexity of this algorithm is . We also present an algorithm which, given a point of defined by polynomials of degree at most , constructs a path joining this point to the roadmap. The complexity of this algorithm is These algorithms easily yield an algorithm which, given two points of defined by polynomials of degree at most , decides whether or not these two points of lie in the same semi-algebraically connected component of and if they do computes a semi-algebraic path in connecting the two points.

     

On Tate-Shafarevich groups of abelian varieties

Let be a finite Galois extension of number fields with Galois group , let be an abelian variety defined over , and let and denote, respectively, the Tate-Shafarevich groups of over and of over . Assuming that these groups are finite, we derive, under certain restrictions on and , a formula for the order of the subgroup of of -invariant elements. As a corollary, we obtain a simple formula relating the orders of , and when is a quadratic extension and is the twist of by the non-trivial character of .

     

A generalization of the Lefschetz fixed point theorem and detection of chaos

We consider the problem of existence of fixed points of a continuous map in (possibly) noninvariant subsets. A pair of subsets of induces a map given by if and elsewhere. The following generalization of the Lefschetz fixed point theorem is proved: If is metrizable, and are compact ANRs, and is continuous, then has a fixed point in provided the Lefschetz number of is nonzero. Actually, we prove an extension of that theorem to the case of a composition of maps. We apply it to a result on the existence of an invariant set of a homeomorphism such that the dynamics restricted to that set is chaotic.

     

Sums of squares of regular functions on real algebraic varieties

Let be an affine algebraic variety over (or any other real closed field ). We ask when it is true that every positive semidefinite (psd) polynomial function on is a sum of squares (sos). We show that for the answer is always negative if has a real point. Also, if is a smooth non-rational curve all of whose points at infinity are real, the answer is again negative. The same holds if is a smooth surface with only real divisors at infinity. The ``compact' case is harder. We completely settle the case of smooth curves of genus : If such a curve has a complex point at infinity, then every psd function is sos, provided the field is archimedean. If is not archimedean, there are counter-examples of genus .

     

A construction of homologically area minimizing hypersurfaces with higher dimensional singular sets

We show that a large variety of singular sets can occur for homologically area minimizing codimension one surfaces in a Riemannian manifold. In particular, as a result of Theorem A, if is smooth, compact dimensional manifold, , and if is an embedded, orientable submanifold of dimension , then we construct metrics on such that the homologically area minimizing hypersurface , homologous to , has a singular set equal to a prescribed number of spheres and tori of codimension less than . Near each component of the singular set, is isometric to a product , where is any prescribed, strictly stable, strictly minimizing cone. In Theorem B, other singular examples are constructed.

     

Extrapolation methods and derivatives of limits of sequences

Let be an infinite sequence whose limit or antilimit can be approximated very efficiently by applying a suitable extrapolation method E to . Assume that the and hence also are differentiable functions of some parameter , being the limit or antilimit of , and that we need to approximate . A direct way of achieving this would be by applying again a suitable extrapolation method E to the sequence , and this approach has often been used efficiently in various problems of practical importance. Unfortunately, as has been observed at least in some important cases, when and have essentially different asymptotic behaviors as , the approximations to produced by this approach, despite the fact that they are good, do not converge as quickly as those obtained for , and this is puzzling. In this paper we first give a rigorous mathematical explanation of this phenomenon for the cases in which E is the Richardson extrapolation process and E is a generalization of it, thus showing that the phenomenon has very little to do with numerics. Following that, we propose a procedure that amounts to first applying the extrapolation method E to and then differentiating the resulting approximations to , and we provide a thorough convergence and stability analysis in conjunction with the Richardson extrapolation process. It follows from this analysis that the new procedure for has practically the same convergence properties as E for . We show that a very efficient way of implementing the new procedure is by actually differentiating the recursion relations satisfied by the extrapolation method used, and we derive the necessary algorithm for the Richardson extrapolation process. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the new approach with numerical examples that also support the theory. We discuss the application of this approach to numerical integration in the presence of endpoint singularities. We also discuss briefly its application in conjunction with other extrapolation methods.

     

Extreme points of the unit ball of the Fourier-Stieltjes algebra

Let be a locally compact group. Among other things, we proved in this paper that for an IN-group , the extreme points of the unit ball of the Fourier-Stieltjes algebra are not in the Fourier algebra if and only if is non-compact, or equivalently, there is no irreducible representation of which is quasi-equivalent to a subrepresentation of the left regular representation of if and only if is non-compact. This result is a non-commutative version of the following well known result: For any locally compact group , the extreme points of the unit ball of the measure algebra are not in the group algebra if and only if is non-discrete. On the other hand, we also showed that if has the RNP, then there are extreme points of the unit ball of that are in . Since it is well known there are non-compact locally compact group for which has the RNP, there exist non-compact locally compact groups where extreme points of the unit ball of can be in . This shows that the condition be an IN-group cannot be entirely removed.

     

A note on -bases of rings

Let be a tower of rings of characteristic . Suppose that is a finitely presented -module. We give necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of -bases of over . Next, let be a polynomial ring where is a perfect field of characteristic , and let be a regular noetherian subring of containing such that . Suppose that is a free -module. Then, applying the above result to a tower of rings, we shall show that a polynomial of minimal degree in is a -basis of over .

     

The number of knot group representations is not a Vassiliev invariant

For a finite group and a knot in the -sphere, let be the number of representations of the knot group into . In answer to a question of D.Altschuler we show that is either constant or not of finite type. Moreover, is constant if and only if is nilpotent. We prove the following, more general boundedness theorem: If a knot invariant is bounded by some function of the braid index, the genus, or the unknotting number, then is either constant or not of finite type.

     

Extensions of holomorphic maps through hypersurfaces and relations to the Hartogs extensions in infinite dimension

A generalization of Kwack's theorem to the infinite dimensional case is obtained. We consider a holomorphic map from into , where is a hypersurface in a complex Banach manifold and is a hyperbolic Banach space. Under various assumptions on , and we show that can be extended to a holomorphic map from into . Moreover, it is proved that an increasing union of pseudoconvex domains containing no complex lines has the Hartogs extension property.

     

Purity of the stratification by Newton polygons

Let be a variety in characteristic . Suppose we are given a nondegenerate -crystal over , for example the th relative crystalline cohomology sheaf of a family of smooth projective varieties over . At each point of we have the Newton polygon associated to the action of on the fibre of the crystal at . According to a theorem of Grothendieck the Newton polygon jumps up under specialization. The main theorem of this paper is that the jumps occur in codimension on (the Purity Theorem). As an application we prove some results on deformations of iso-simple -divisible groups.

     

An extension of a non-commutative Choquet-Deny theorem

Let be a discrete group, and let be a normal subgroup of . Then the quotient map induces a group algebra homomorphism . It is shown that the kernel of this map may be decomposed as , where is a closed right ideal with a bounded left approximate identity and is a closed left ideal with a bounded right approximate identity. It follows from this fact that, if is a closed two-sided ideal in , then is closed in . This answers a question of Reiter.

     

On a hyperplane section theorem of Gurjar

A hyperplane section theorem by R. V. Gurjar [3] is given a short proof. Power series in any number (at least three) of variables satsifying the condition of the theorem are explicitly constructed. In the course of the proof, the restrictive-looking condition of the theorem is given an easy sufficient condition from the view point of the weighted projective spaces. Received April 12, 2000 / Accepted August 21, 2000 / Published online October 30, 2000     

The globally irreducible representations of symmetric groups

Let be an algebraic number field and be the ring of integers of . Let be a finite group and be a finitely generated torsion free -module. We say that is a globally irreducible -module if, for every maximal ideal of , the -module is irreducible, where stands for the residue field .

Answering a question of Pham Huu Tiep, we prove that the symmetric group does not have non-trivial globally irreducible modules. More precisely we establish that if is a globally irreducible -module, then is an -module of rank with the trivial or sign action of .