Calculus of Variations and Geometric Measure Theory

Geodesic distances on Banach manifolds

Daniele Tiberio (SISSA)

created by pluda on 30 Nov 2021

6 dec 2021 -- 14:30   [open in google calendar]

Aula Seminari, Dipartimento di Matematica di Pisa

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Abstract.

In a connected Banach manifold, equipped with a weak Riemannian metric, we show that the infimum of the lengths among all piecewise smooth curves joining two points (namely, the geodesic "distance") does not define a distance in general. We construct a simple counterxample in l2. In addition, if a weak Riemannian metric is left invariant on a Banach Lie group, the geodesic "distance" still may not be a distance. Indeed, we construct a counterexample in the infinite dimensional Heisenberg group, and we show how the sectional curvatures can be calculated for some specific planes, confirming a phenomenon first observed by Michor and Mumford. This is a joint work in collaboration with Professor Valentino Magnani (University of Pisa).