We study harmonic maps from degenerating Riemann surfaces with uniformly bounded energy and show the so-called generalized energy identity. We find conditions that are both necessary and sufficient for the compactness in $W^{1,2}$ and $C^{0}$ modulo bubbles of sequences of such maps.
We study Dirac-harmonic maps from degenerating spin surfaces with uniformly bounded energy and show the so-called generalized energy identity in the case that the domain converges to a spin surface with only Neveu-Schwarz type nodes. We find condition that is both necessary and sufficient for the $W^{1,2} \times L^{4}$ modulo bubbles compactness of a sequence of such maps.
In this paper we prove a uniform estimate for the gradient of the Green function on a closed Riemann surface, independent of its conformal class, and we derive compactness results for immersions with L2-bounded second fundamental form and for riemannian surfaces of uniformly bounded gaussian curvature entropy.
We study the blow-up analysis and qualitative behavior for a sequence of harmonic maps with free boundary from degenerating bordered Riemann surfaces with uniformly bounded energy. With the help of Pohozaev type constants associated to harmonic maps defined on degenerating collars, including vertical boundary collars and horizontal boundary collars, we establish a generalized energy identity.
We prove a gluing theorem for solutions of Hitchin's self-duality equations with logarithmic singularities on a rank-2 vector bundle over a noded Riemann surface representing a boundary point of Teichmüller moduli space.
We study the existence of harmonic maps and Dirac-harmonic maps from degenerating surfaces to non-positive curved manifold via the scheme of Sacks and Uhlenbeck. By choosing a suitable sequence of $α$-(Dirac-)harmonic maps from a sequence of suitable closed surfaces degenerating to a hyperbolic surface, we get the convergence and a cleaner energy identity under the uniformly bounded energy assumption. In this energy identity, there is no energy loss near the punctures. As an application, we obtain an existence result about (Dirac-)harmonic maps from degenerating (spin) surfaces. If the energie…
We develop an asymptotic expansion of the spectral measures on a degenerating family of hyperbolic Riemann surfaces of finite volume. As an application of our results, we study the asymptotic behavior of weighted counting functions, which, if $M$ is compact, is defined for $w \geq 0$ and $T > 0$ by $$N_{M,w}(T) = \sum\limits_{λ_n \leq T}(T-λ_n)^w $$ where $\{λ_n\}$ is the set of eigenvalues of the Laplacian which acts on the space of smooth functions on $M$. If $M$ is non-compact, then the weighted counting function is defined via the inverse Laplace transform. Now let $M_{\ell}$ denote a dege…
We study sharp asymptotics of the first eigenvalue on Riemannian surfaces obtained from a fixed Riemannian surface by attaching a collapsing flat handle or cross cap to it. Through a careful choice of parameters this construction can be used to strictly increase the first eigenvalue normalized by area if the initial surface has some symmetries. If these symmetries are not present we show that the first eigenvalue normalized by area strictly decreases for the same range of parameters. These results are the main motivation for the construction in \cite{MS3}, where we show a monotonicity result f…
For a sequence of extrinsic or intrinsic biharmonic maps $u_j: M_j\rightarrow N$ from a sequence of non-collapsed degenerating closed Einstein 4-manifolds $(M_j,g_j)$ with bounded Einstein constants, bounded diameters and bounded $L^2$ curvature energy into a compact Riemannian manifold $(N,h)$ with uniformly bounded biharmonic energy, we establish a compactness theory modular finitely many bubbles, which are finite energy biharmonic maps from $\mathbb{R}^4$, or from $\mathbb{R}^4 / Γ$ for some nontrivial finite group $Γ\subset SO(4)$, or from some complete, noncompact, Ricci flat, non-flat AL…
We prove a sharp criterion on the decay of the tension of almost harmonic maps from degenerating surfaces that ensures that such maps subconverge to a limiting object that is made up entirely of harmonic maps.
Given a compact Riemann surface $Y$ and a positive integer $m$, Narasimhan and Simha defined a measure on $Y$ associated to the $m$-th tensor power of the canonical line bundle. We study the limit of this measure on holomorphic families of Riemann surfaces with semistable reduction. The convergence takes place on a hybrid space whose central fiber is the associated metrized curve complex in the sense of Amini and Baker. We also study the limit of the measure induced by the Hermitian pairing defined by the Narasimhan-Simha measure. For $m = 1$, both these measures coincide with the Bergman meas…
In the present work we establish a quantization result for the angular part of the energy of solu- tions to elliptic linear systems of Schrödinger type with antisymmetric potentials in two dimension. This quantization is a consequence of uniform Lorentz-Wente type estimates in degenerating annuli. We derive from this angular quantization the full energy quantization for general critical points to functionals which are conformally invariant or also for pseudo-holomorphic curves on degenerating Riemann surfaces.
We consider harmonic maps into pseudo-Riemannian manifolds. We show the removability of isolated singularities for continuous maps, i.e. that any continuous map from an open subset of R^m into a pseudo-Riemannian manifold which is two times continuously differentiable and harmonic everywhere outside an isolated point is actually smooth harmonic everywhere.
We establish an energy quantization result for sequences of Willmore surfaces when the underlying sequence of Riemann surfaces is degenerating in the moduli space. we notably exhibit a new residue which quantifies the potential loss of energy in collar regions. Thanks to these residues, we also prove compactness of Willmore immersion with bounded conformal class and energy below $12π$.
We show the smoothness of weakly Dirac-harmonic maps from a closed spin Riemann surface into stationary Lorentzian manifolds, and obtain a regularity theorem for a class of critical elliptic systems without anti-symmetry structures.
$\infty$-Harmonic maps are a generalization of $\infty$-harmonic functions. They can be viewed as the limiting cases of p-harmonic maps as p goes to infinity. In this paper, we give complete classifications of linear and quadratic $\infty$-harmonic maps from and into a sphere, quadratic $\infty$-harmonic maps between Euclidean spaces. We describe all linear and quadratic $\infty$-harmonic maps between Nil and Euclidean spaces, between Sol and Euclidean spaces. We also study holomorphic $\infty$-harmonic maps between complex Euclidean spaces.
On non-Kähler manifolds the notion of harmonic maps is modified to that of Hermitian harmonic maps in order to be compatible with the complex structure. The resulting semilinear elliptic system is {\it not} in divergence form. The case of noncompact complete preimage and target manifolds is considered. We give conditions for existence and uniqueness of Hermitian-harmonic maps and solutions of the corresponding parabolic system, which observe the non-divergence form of the underlying equations. Numerous examples illustrate the theoretical results and the fundamental difference to harmonic maps.
We extend the well-known Denjoy-Ahlfors theorem on the number of different asymptotic tracts of holomorphic functions to subharmonic functions on arbitrary Riemannian manifolds. We obtain some new versions of the Liouville theorem for $\p$-harmonic functions without requiring the geodesic completeness requirement of a manifold. Moreover, an upper estimate of the topological index of the height function on a minimal surface in $\R{n}$ has been established and, as a consequence, a new proof of Bernstein's theorem on entire solutions has been derived. Other applications to minimal surfaces are al…
Given a hyperbolic surface and a simple closed geodesic on it, complex-twists along the curve produce a holomorphic family of deformations in Teichmüller space, degenerating to the Riemann surface where it is pinched. We show there is a corresponding Teichmüller disk such that the two are strongly asymptotic, in the Teichmüller metric, around the noded Riemann surface. We establish a similar comparison with plumbing deformations that open the node.
We consider harmonic diffeomorphisms to a fixed hyperbolic target $Y$, from a family of domain Riemann surfaces degenerating along a Teichmüller ray. We use the work of Minsky to show that there is a limiting harmonic map from the conformal limit of the Teichmüller ray, to a crowned hyperbolic surface. The target surface is the metric completion of the complement of a geodesic lamination on $Y$. The conformal limit is obtained by attaching half-planes and cylinders to the critical graph of the holomorphic quadratic differential determining the ray. As an application, we provide a new proof of …
We study the transversally harmonic maps between foliated Riemannian manifolds. In particular, we prove that under some curvature conditions, any transversally harmonic map is transversally totally geodesic.
We extend the well-known Sacks-Uhlenbeck energy gap result (1981) for harmonic maps from closed Riemann surfaces into closed Riemannian manifolds from the case of maps with small energy (thus near a constant map), to the case of harmonic maps with high absolute energy but small energy relative to a reference harmonic map.
In this paper, we consider critical maps of a horizontal energy functional for maps from a sub-Riemannian manifold to a Riemannian manifold. These critical maps are referred to as subelliptic harmonic maps. In terms of the subelliptic harmonic map heat flow, we investigate the existence problem for subelliptic harmonic maps. Under the assumption that the target Riemannian manifold has non-positive sectional curvature, we prove some Eells-Sampson type existence results for this flow when the source manifold is either a step-2 sub-Riemannian manifold or a step-r sub-Riemannian manifold whose sub…
J.Eells and L. Lemaire introduced k-harmonic maps, and T. Ichiyama, J. Inoguchi and H.Urakawa showed the first variation formula. In this paper, we describe the ordinary differential equations of $3$-harmonic curves into a Riemannian manifold with constant sectional curvature, and show biharmonic curve is k-harmonic curve $(k\geq 2)$.
In this paper, we show that every harmonic map from a compact Kähler manifold with uniformly RC-positive curvature to a Riemannian manifold with non-positive complex sectional curvature is constant. In particular, there is no non-constant harmonic map from a compact Kähler manifold with positive holomorphic sectional curvature to a Riemannian manifold with non-positive complex sectional curvature.
We present some results about harmonic maps with possibly infinite energy from punctured Riemann surfaces to CAT(0) spaces. In particular, we give precise estimates of their energy growth near the punctures and prove their uniqueness.
In this paper we generalize harmonic maps and morphisms to the \emph{degenerate semi-Riemannian category}, in the case when the manifolds $M$ and $N$ are \emph{stationary} and the map $ϕ:M\to N$ is \emph{radical-preserving}. We characterize geometrically the notion of \emph{(generalized) horizontal (weak) conformality} and we obtain a characterization for (generalized) harmonic morphisms in terms of (generalized) harmonic maps.
f-Harmonic maps were first introduced and studied by Lichnerowicz in \cite{Li} (see also Section 10.20 in Eells-Lemaire's report \cite{EL}). In this paper, we study a subclass of f-harmonic maps called f-harmonic morphisms which pull back local harmonic functions to local f-harmonic functions. We prove that a map between Riemannian manifolds is an f-harmonic morphism if and only if it is a horizontally weakly conformal f-harmonic map. This generalizes the well-known Fuglede-Ishihara characterization for harmonic morphisms. Some properties and many examples as well as some non-existence of f-ha…
In this paper, we discuss the heat flow of a pseudo-harmonic map from a closed pseudo-Hermitian manifold to a Riemannian manifold with non-positive sectional curvature, and prove the existence of the pseudo-harmonic map which is a generalization of Eells-Sampson's existence theorem. We also discuss the uniqueness of the pseudo-harmonic representative of its homotopy class which is a generalization of Hartman theorem, provided that the target manifold has negative sectional curvature.
Motivated from the action functional for bosonic strings with extrinsic curvature term we introduce an action functional for maps between Riemannian manifolds that interpolates between the actions for harmonic and biharmonic maps. Critical points of this functional will be called interpolating sesqui-harmonic maps. In this article we initiate a rigorous mathematical treatment of this functional and study various basic aspects of its critical points.
J. Eells and L. Lemaire introduced k-harmonic maps, and Wang Shaobo showed the first variational formula. When, k=2, it is called biharmonic maps (2-harmonic maps). There have been extensive studies in the area. In this paper, we consider the relationship between biharmonic maps and k-harmonic maps, and show non-existence theorem of 3-harmonic maps. We also give the definition of k-harmonic submanifolds of Euclidean spaces, and study k-harmonic curve in Euclidean spaces. Futhermore, we give a conjecture for k-harmonic submanifolds of Euclidean spaces.
In this paper we consider the local $L^p$ estimate of Riemannian curvature for the Ricci-harmonic flow or List's flow introduced by List \cite{List2005} on complete noncompact manifolds. As an application, under the assumption that the flow exists on a finite time interval $[0,T)$ and the Ricci curvature is uniformly bounded, we prove that the $L^p$ norm of Riemannian curvature is bounded, and then, applying the De Giorgi-Nash-Moser iteration method, obtain the local boundedness of Riemannian curvature and consequently the flow can be continuously extended past $T$.
In the previous paper [GLM2018], we showed that the theory of harmonic maps between Riemannian manifolds may be discretized by introducing triangulations with vertex and edge weights on the domain manifold. In the present paper, we study convergence of the discrete theory to the smooth theory when taking finer and finer triangulations. We present suitable conditions on the weighted triangulations that ensure convergence of discrete harmonic maps to smooth harmonic maps. Our computer software Harmony implements these methods to computes equivariant harmonic maps in the hyperbolic plane.
Characterizations for Riemannian submersions to be harmonic or biharmonic are shown. Examples of biharmonic but not harmonic Riemannian submersions are shown.
We investigate the structure of a harmonic morphism $F$ from a Riemannian 4-manifold M^4 to a 2-surface $N^2$ near a critical point $m_0$. If $m_0$ is an isolated critical point or if $M^4$ is compact without boundary, we show that $F$ is pseudo-holomorphic w.r.t. an almost Hermitian structure defined in a neighbourhood of $m_0$. If $M^4$ is compact without boundary, the singular fibres of $F$ are branched minimal surfaces.
Let $Σ$ be a compact Riemann surface and $D_1,...,D_n$ a finite number of pairwise disjoint closed disks of $Σ$. We prove the existence of a proper harmonic map into the Euclidean plane from a hyperbolic domain $Ω$ containing $Σ\backslash\cup_{j=1}^n D_j$ and of its topological type. Here, $Ω$ can be chosen as close as necessary to $Σ\backslash\cup_{j=1}^n D_j$. In particular, we obtain proper harmonic maps from the unit disk into the Euclidean plane, which disproves a conjecture posed by R. Schoen and S.T. Yau.
Both bi-harmonic map and $f$-harmonic map have nice physical motivation and applications. In this paper, by combination of these two harmonic maps, we introduce and study $f$-bi-harmonic maps as the critical points of the $f$-bi-energy functional $\frac{1}{2}\int_M f|τ(ϕ)|^2dv_{g}$. This class of maps generalizes both concepts of harmonic maps and bi-harmonic maps. We first derive the $f$-biharmonic map equation and then use it to study $f$-bi-harmonicity of some special maps, including conformal maps between manifolds of same dimensions, some product maps between direct product manifold and s…
The variational theory of higher-power energy is developed for mappings between Riemannian manifolds, and more generally sections of submersions of Riemannian manifolds, and applied to sections of Riemannian vector bundles and their sphere subbundles. A complete classification is then given for left-invariant vector fields on 3-dimensional unimodular Lie groups equipped with an arbitrary left-invariant Riemannian metric.
Harmonic maps from Riemann surfaces arise from a conformally invariant variational problem. Therefore, on one hand, they are intimately connected with moduli spaces of Riemann surfaces, and on the other hand, because the conformal group is noncompact, constitute a prototype for the formation of singularities, the so-called bubbles, in geometric analysis. In theoretical physics, they arise from the nonlinear $σ$-model of quantum field theory. That model possesses a supersymmetric extension, coupling a harmonic map like field with a nonlinear spinor field. In the physical model, that spinor fiel…
Riemann surfaces are two-dimensional manifolds with a conformal class of metrics. It is well known that the harmonic action functional and harmonic maps are tools to study the moduli space of Riemann surfaces. Super Riemann surfaces are an analogue of Riemann surfaces in the world of super geometry. After a short introduction to super differential geometry we will compare Riemann surfaces and super Riemann surfaces. We will see that super Riemann surfaces can be viewed as Riemann surfaces with an additional field, the gravitino. An extension of the harmonic action functional to super Riemann s…
In this paper, we introduce a Liouville action for a harmonic diffeomorphism from a compact Riemann surface to a compact hyperbolic Riemann surface of genus $g\ge 2$. We derive the variational formula of this Liouville action for harmonic diffeomorphisms when the source Riemann surfaces vary with a fixed target Riemann surface.
In this paper, we give an estimate of sub-Laplacian of Riemannian distance functions in pseudo-Hermitian geometry which plays a similar role as Laplacian comparison theorem in Riemannian geometry, and deduce a prior horizontal gradient estimate of pseudo-harmonic maps from pseudo-Hermitian manifolds to regular balls of Riemannian manifolds. As an application, Liouville theorem is established under the conditions of nonnegative pseudo-Hermitian Ricci curvature and vanishing pseudo-Hermitian torsion. Moreover, we obtain the existence of pseudo-harmonic maps from complete noncompact pseudo-Hermit…
We construct a parabolic entire minimal graph $S$ over a finite topology complete Riemannian surface $Σ$ of curvature $-1$ and infinite area (thus of non-parabolic conformal type). The vertical projection of this graph yields a harmonic diffeomorphism from $S$ onto $Σ$. The proof uses the theory of divergence lines to construct minimal graphs. We also generalize a theorem of R. Schoen. Let $g_1$ and $g_2$ be two complete metrics on a orientable surface $S$ with compact boundary and suppose $$\int_{S_r^2}K_{g_2}^-dσ_{g_2}\le C\ln(2+r)$$ for some $C>0$ and all $r>0$. If there is a harmonic diffe…
After establishing the uniqueness of the continuation of local Cauchy data for harmonic maps between two Riemannian manifolds M and N, we prove (i) a reflection principle for a smooth minimal submanifold Y of a Riemannian manifold M that contains a reflective submanifold of M as a hypersurface and (ii) the reflection principle of for a class of smooth harmonic maps between Riemannian manifolds that admit reflective submanifolds. A reflection principle for harmonic functions on M with respect to a reflective hypersurface of M follows easily from the above reflection principle. To consider refle…
In this paper, we study the existence of various harmonic maps from Hermitian manifolds to Kaehler, Hermitian and Riemannian manifolds respectively. By using refined Bochner formulas on Hermitian (possibly non-Kaehler) manifolds, we derive new rigidity results on Hermitian harmonic maps from compact Hermitian manifolds to Riemannian manifolds, and we also obtain the complex analyticity of pluri-harmonic maps from compact complex manifolds to compact Kaehler manifolds (and Riemannian manifolds) with non-degenerate curvatures, which are analogous to several fundamental results in [28,Siu], [14,J…
Let $(M,H,g_H;g)$ be a sub-Riemannian manifold and $(N,h)$ be a Riemannian manifold. For a smooth map $u: M \to N$, we consider the energy functional $E_G(u) = \frac{1}{2} \int_M[|\mathrm{d}u_H|^2-2G(u)] \mathrm{d}V_M$, where $\mathrm{d}u_H$ is the horizontal differential of $u$, $G:N\to \mathbb{R}$ is a smooth function on $N$. The critical maps of $E_G(u)$ are referred to as subelliptic harmonic maps with potential $G$. In this paper, we investigate the existence problem for subelliptic harmonic maps with potentials by a subelliptic heat flow. Assuming that the target Riemannian manifold has …
In this paper, we investigate subelliptic harmonic maps with potential from noncompact complete sub-Riemannian manifolds corresponding to totally geodesic Riemannian foliations. Under some suitable conditions, we give the gradient estimates of these maps and establish a Liouville type result.