We consider a certain sequence of flat vector bundles on a compact locally symmetric orbifold, and we evaluate explicitly the associated asymptotic Ray-Singer real analytic torsion. The basic idea is to computing the heat trace via Selberg's trace formula, so that a key point in this paper is to evaluate the orbital integrals associated with nontrivial elliptic elements. For that purpose, we deduce a geometric localization formula, so that we can rewrite an elliptic orbital integral as a sum of certain identity orbital integrals associated with the centralizer of that elliptic element. The explicit geometric formula of Bismut for semisimple orbital integrals plays an essential role in these computations.
In this paper, we establish an equality between the analytic torsion introduced by Dar\cite{MR876230} and the orbifold analytic torsion defined by Ma \cite{MR2140438} on a compact manifold with isolated conical singularities which in addition has an orbifold structure. We assume the orbifold flat vector bundle is an honest vector bundle, although the metric on the flat bundle may not be flat.
This is the writeup of a lecture given at the May Wisconsin workshop on mathematical aspects of orbifold string theory. In the first part of this lecture, we review recent work on discrete torsion, and outline how it is currently understood in terms of the B field. In the second part of this lecture, we discuss the relationship between quotient stacks and string orbifolds.
This article is devoted to a study of flat orbifold vector bundles. We construct a bijection between the isomorphic classes of proper flat orbifold vector bundles and the equivalence classes of representations of the orbifold fundamental groups of base orbifolds. We establish a Bismut-Zhang like anomaly formula for the Ray-Singer metric on the determine line of the cohomology of a compact orbifold with coefficients in an orbifold flat vector bundle. We show that the analytic torsion of an acyclic unitary flat orbifold vector bundle is equal to the value at zero of a dynamical zeta function whe…
We study the analytic torsion of odd-dimensional hyperbolic orbifolds $Γ\backslash \mathbb{H}^{2n+1}$, depending on a representation of $Γ$. Our main goal is to understand the asymptotic behavior of the analytic torsion with respect to sequences of representations associated to rays of highest weights.
In this article, we study the twisting procedure of orbifold cohomology. We introduce local system and construct twisted orbifold cohomology. Then, we generalize Vafa-Witten's notion of discrete torsion to general orbifold and examine its relation to local system. Finally, some examples are computed.
A Riemannian orbifold is a mildly singular generalization of a Riemannian manifold which is locally modeled on the quotient of a connected, open manifold under a finite group of isometries. If all of the isometries used to define the local structures of an entire orbifold are orientation preserving, we call the orbifold locally orientable. We use heat invariants to show that a Riemannian orbifold which is locally orientable cannot be Laplace isospectral to a Riemannian orbifold which is not locally orientable. As a corollary we observe that a Riemannian orbifold that is not locally orientable …
We consider the interpretation in classical geometry of conformal field theories constructed from orbifolds with discrete torsion. In examples we can analyze, these spacetimes contain ``stringy regions'' that from a classical point of view are singularities that are to be neither resolved nor blown up. Some of these models also give particularly simple and clear examples of mirror symmetry.
In this technical note we give a purely geometric understanding of discrete torsion, as an analogue of orbifold Wilson lines for two-form tensor field potentials. In order to introduce discrete torsion in this context, we describe gerbes and the description of certain type II supergravity tensor field potentials as connections on gerbes. Discrete torsion then naturally appears in describing the action of the orbifold group on (1-)gerbes, just as orbifold Wilson lines appear in describing the action of the orbifold group on the gauge bundle. Our results are not restricted to trivial gerbes -- i…
In this paper we introduce the concept of Deligne cohomology of an orbifold. We prove that the third Deligne cohomology group of a smooth étale groupoid classify gerbes with connection over the groupoid. We argue that the $B$-field and the discrete torsion in type II superstring theories are special kinds of gerbes with connection, and finally, for each one of them, using Deligne cohomology we construct a flat line bundle over the inertia groupoid, namely a Ruan inner local in the case of an orbifold.
We study the geometry and topology of Riemannian 3-orbifolds which are locally volume collapsed with respect to a curvature scale. We show that a sufficiently collapsed closed 3-orbifold without bad 2-suborbifolds either admits a metric of nonnegative sectional curvature or satisfies Thurston's Geometrization Conjecture. We also prove a version with boundary. Kleiner and Lott independently proved similar results.
We examine the moduli spaces of Type~A connections on oriented and unoriented surfaces both with and without torsion in relation to the signature of the associated symmetric Ricci tensor. If the signature of the symmetric Ricci tensor is (1,1) or (0,2), the moduli spaces are smooth. If the signature is (2,0), there is an orbifold singularity.
In this paper an explicit formula for a lower bound on the volume of a hyperbolic orbifold, dependent on dimension and the maximal order of torsion in the orbifolds' fundamental group, is constructed.
We show that if $g$ is a Riemannian metric on a closed piecewise locally symmetric manifold $M$, then the lift of $g$ to the universal cover $\widetilde{M}$ has a discrete isometry group. We also show that the index $[\Isom(\widetilde{M}): π_1(M)]$ is bounded by a constant independent of $g$.
An old problem asks whether a Riemannian manifold can be isospectral to a Riemannian orbifold with nontrivial singular set. In this short note we show that under the assumption of Schanuel's conjecture in transcendental number theory, this is impossible whenever the orbifold and manifold in question are length-commensurable compact locally symmetric spaces of nonpositive curvature associated to simple Lie groups.
In this paper, we prove several structure theorems for locally conformally flat, positive Yamabe orbifolds and nonnegative scalar curvature, ALE manifolds. These two kinds of spaces can be related by conformal blow-up and conformal compactification. For the orbifolds, we prove that such orbifolds admit a manifold cover. For the ALE manifolds, the homomorphism of the fundamental group for the ALE space induced by the embedding of the ALE end is always injective. Using these properties, several classifications of such ALE manifolds and orbifolds are given in low dimensions. As an application to …
An orbifold $X$ is locally homeomorphic to $G_x\backslash B_r(0)$, where $G_x$ is a finite group acting on $B_r(0)\subset{\mathbb R}^n$, so that $G_x(0)=0$. For collapsing orbifolds with isolated singularities, we show there is a uniform bound in $|G_x|$.
We reconcile between two classical models of edge-dislocations in solids. The first model, dating from the early 1900s models isolated edge-dislocations as line singularities in locally-Euclidean manifolds. The second model, dating from the 1950s, models continuously-distributed edge-dislocations as smooth manifolds endowed with non-symmetric affine connections (equivalently, endowed with torsion fields). In both models, the solid is modeled as a Weitzenböck manifold. We prove, using a weak notion of convergence [KM15], that the second model can be obtained rigorously as a homogenization limit…
We show that the Ruelle dynamical zeta function on a closed odd dimensional locally symmetric space twisted by an arbitrary flat vector bundle has a meromorphic extension to the whole complex plane and that its leading term in the Laurent series at the zero point is related to the regularised determinant of the flat Laplacian of Cappell-Miller. When the flat vector bundle is close to an acyclic and unitary one, we show that the dynamical zeta function is regular at the zero point and that its value is equal to the complex valued analytic torsion of Cappell-Miller. This generalises author's pre…
We give a new construction of compact Riemannian 7-manifolds with holonomy $G_2$. Let $M$ be a torsion-free $G_2$-manifold (which can have holonomy a proper subgroup of $G_2$) such that $M$ admits an involution $ι$ preserving the $G_2$-structure. Then $M/{\langle ι\rangle}$ is a $G_2$-orbifold, with singular set $L$ an associative submanifold of $M$, where the singularities are locally of the form $\mathbb R^3 \times (\mathbb R^4 / \{\pm 1\})$. We resolve this orbifold by gluing in a family of Eguchi-Hanson spaces, parametrized by a nonvanishing closed and coclosed $1$-form $λ$ on $L$. Much of…
We show that the torsion of any simple closed curve $Γ$ in Euclidean 3-space changes sign at least $4$ times provided that it is star-shaped and locally convex with respect to a point $o$ in the interior of its convex hull. The latter condition means that through each point $p$ of $Γ$ there passes a plane $H$, not containing $o$, such that a neighborhood of $p$ in $Γ$ lies on the same side of $H$ as does $o$. This generalizes the four vertex theorem of Sedykh for convex space curves. Following Thorbergsson and Umehara, we reduce the proof to the result of Segre on inflections of spherical curv…
In this note, we prove the existence of a closed geodesic of positive length on any compact developable orbifold of dimension 3, 5, or 7. The argument uses the stratification of the singular locus, and reduces the problem of existence of a closed geodesic on a compact developable orbifold to the case of even dimensional orbifolds with zero-dimensional singular locus and orbifold fundamental group infinite torsion and of odd exponent.
We study an index of a transversal Dirac operator on an odd-dimensional manifold $X$ with locally free $\mathbb{S}^1$-action. One difficulty of using heat kernel method lies in the understanding of the asymptotic expansion as $t\to 0^+$. By a probabilistic approach via the Feynman-Kac formula, the transversal heat kernel on $X$ can be linked to the ordinary heat kernel for functions on the orbifold $M=X/\mathbb{S}^1$ which is more tractable. After some technical results for a uniform bound estimate as $t\to 0^+$, we are reduced from the transversal, orbifold situation to the classical situatio…
On a compact complex manifold we study the behaviour of strong Kähler with torsion (strong KT) structures under small deformations of the complex structure and the problem of extension of a strong KT metric. In this context we obtain the analogous result of Miyaoka extension theorem. Studying the blow-up of a strong KT manifold at a point or along a complex submanifold, we prove that a complex orbifold endowed with a strong KT metric admits a strong KT resolution. In this way we obtain new examples of compact simply-connected strong KT manifolds.
The holomorphic torsion of a compact locally symmetric manifold is expressed as a special value of a zeta function built out of geometric data (closed geodesics) of the manifold.
The equivariant holomorphic torsion of a compact locally symmetric manifold and an automorphism is expressed as a special value of a zeta function built out of geometric data (closed geodesics) of the manifold.
We give a new short self-contained proof of the result of Opozda [B. Opozda, A classification of locally homogeneous connections on 2-dimensional manifolds, Differential Geom. Appl. 21 (2004), 173-198.] classifying the locally homogeneous torsion free affine surfaces and the extension to the case of surfaces with torsion due to Arias-Marco and Kowalski [T. Arias-Marco and O. Kowalski, Classification of locally homogeneous linear connections with arbitrary torsion on 2-dimensional manifolds, Monatsh. Math. 153 (2008), 1-18.]. Our approach rests on a direct analysis of the affine Killing equatio…
We give a classification of toric anti-self-dual conformal structures on compact 4-orbifolds with positive Euler characteristic. Our proof is twistor theoretic: the interaction between the complex torus orbits in the twistor space and the twistor lines induces meromorphic data, which we use to recover the conformal structure. A compact anti-self-dual orbifold can also be constructed by adding a point at infinity to an asymptotically locally Euclidean (ALE) scalar-flat Kähler orbifold. We use this observation to classify ALE scalar-flat Kähler 4-orbifolds whose isometry group contain a 2-torus.
In a previous paper we outlined how discrete torsion can be understood geometrically as an analogue of orbifold U(1) Wilson lines. In this paper we shall prove the remaining details. More precisely, in this paper we describe gerbes in terms of objects known as stacks (essentially, sheaves of categories), and develop much of the basic theory of gerbes in such language. Then, once the relevant technology has been described, we give a first-principles geometric derivation of discrete torsion. In other words, we define equivariant gerbes, and classify equivariant structures on gerbes and on gerbes…
In this paper, we provide a concrete interpretation of equivariant Reidemeister torsion and demonstrate that Bismut-Zhang's equivariant Cheeger-Müller theorem simplifies considerably when applied to locally symmetric spaces. In a companion paper, this allows us to extend recent results on torsion cohomology growth and torsion cohomology comparison for arithmetic locally symmetric spaces an equivariant setting.
Torsions, curvatures, structure equations and Bianchi identities for locally anisotropic superspaces (containing as particular cases different supersymmetric extensions and prolongations of Riemann, Finsler, Lagrange and Kaluza--Klein spaces) are investigated.
We study symmetric affine surfaces which have non-vanishing torsion tensor. We give a complete classification of the local geometries possible if the torsion is assumed parallel. This generalizes a previous result of Opozda in the torsion free setting; these geometries are all locally homogeneous. If the torsion is not parallel, we assume the underlying surface is locally homogeneous and provide a complete classification in this setting as well.
For a proper, cocompact action by a locally compact group of the form $H \times G$, with $H$ compact, we define an $H \times G$-equivariant index of $H$-transversally elliptic operators, which takes values in $KK_*(C^*H, C^*G)$. This simultaneously generalises the Baum--Connes analytic assembly map, Atiyah's index of transversally elliptic operators, and Kawasaki's orbifold index. This index also generalises the assembly map to elliptic operators on orbifolds. In the special case where the manifold in question is a real semisimple Lie group, $G$ is a cocompact lattice and $H$ is a maximal comp…
We prove that the torsion of any closed space curve which bounds a simply connected locally convex surface vanishes at least 4 times. This answers a question of Rosenberg related to a problem of Yau on characterizing the boundary of positively curved disks in Euclidean space. Furthermore, our result generalizes the 4 vertex theorem of Sedykh for convex space curves, and thus constitutes a far reaching extension of the classical 4 vertex theorem. The proof involves studying the arrangement of convex caps in a locally convex surface, and yields a Bose type formula for these objects.
We show that the absolute value at zero of the Ruelle zeta function defined by the geodesic flow coincides with the higher-dimensional Reidemeister torsion for the unit tangent bundle over a 2-dimensional hyperbolic orbifold and a non-unitary representation of the fundamental group. Our proof is based on the integral expression of the Ruelle zeta function. This integral expression is derived from the functional equation of the Selberg zeta function for a discrete subgroup with elliptic elements in PSL(2;R). We also show that the asymptotic behavior of the higher-dimensional Reidemeister torsio…
Necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of a hyper-parahermitian connection with totally skew-symmetric torsion (HPKT-structure) are presented. It is shown that any HPKT-structure is locally generated by a real (potential) function. An invariant first order differential operator is defined on any almost hyper-paracomplex manifold showing that it is two-step nilpotent exactly when the almost hyper-paracomplex structure is integrable. A local HPKT-potential is expressed in terms of this operator. Examples of (locally) invariant HPKT-structures with closed as well as non-closed tors…
Let Y be a noncompact rank one locally symmetric space of finite volume. Then Y has a finite number e(Y) > 0 of topological ends. In this paper, we show that for any natural number n, the Y with e(Y) \leq n that are arithmetic fall into finitely many commensurability classes. In particular, there is a constant c_n such that n-cusped arithmetic orbifolds do not exist in dimension greater than c_n. We make this explicit for one-cusped arithmetic hyperbolic n-orbifolds and prove that none exist for n \geq 30.
We give a dynamical description, in terms of a Weil-type zeta function, to the holomorphic torsion with coefficients for certain compact Hermitian locally symmetric manifolds, whose connected group G of isometries of the universal cover has only one conjugacy class of cuspidal maximal parabolic subgroup and satisfies a technical Ansatz relative to the given coefficients. A distinguishing feature of our zeta function is that its construction involves in an essential way the geometry of a standard compactification of the universal cover. The two senior authors are indebted to their junior collea…
Let $π:M\to B$ be a proper holomorphic submersion between complex manifolds and ${\cal E}$ a holomorphic bundle on $M$. We study and describe explicitly the torsion subsheaf $\mathrm{Tors}(R^1π_*({\cal E}))$ of the first direct image $R^1π_*(\mathcal{E})$ under the assumption $R^0π_*(\mathcal{E})=0$. We give two applications of our results. The first concerns the locus of points in the base of a generically versal family of complex surfaces where the family is non-versal. The second application is a vanishing result for $H^0(\mathrm{Tors}(R^1π_*(\mathcal{E})))$ in a concrete situation related …
