Any two compact, complete, one-dimensional geodesic spaces with identical marked length spectrum have isometric $π_1$-hull.
The present version contains errors, notably in Lemmas 2.2 and 2.3 (path cancellations can be more complicated), which then propagate through the paper. The main result is correct as stated, and a proof can be found in the joint paper with David Constantine, arXiv:1209.3709
We consider a coarse version of the marked length spectrum rigidity: given a group with two left invariant metrics, if the marked length spectrum (the translation length function) under the two metrics are the same, then the two metrics are uniformly close. We prove the rigidity theorem for relatively hyperbolic groups. This generalizes a result of Fujiwara.
We study the geometry of hyperbolic cone surfaces, possibly with cusps or geodesic boundaries. We prove that any hyperbolic cone structure on a surface of non-exceptional type is determined up to isotopy by the geodesic lengths of a finite specific homotopy classes of non-peripheral simple closed curves. As an application, we show that the Thurston asymmetric metric is well-defined on the Teichmüller space of hyperbolic cone surfaces with fixed cone angles and boundary lengths. We compare such a Teichmüller space with the Teichmüller space of complete hyperbolic surfaces with punctures, by sho…
We consider finite 2-complexes X that arise as quotients of Fuchsian buildings by subgroups of the combinatorial automorphism group, which we assume act freely and cocompactly. We show that locally CAT(-1) metrics on X which are piecewise hyperbolic and satisfy a natural non-singularity condition at vertices are marked length spectrum rigid within certain classes of negatively curved, piecewise Riemannian metrics on X. As a key step in our proof, we show that the marked length spectrum function for such metrics determines the volume of X.
We extend the mathematical theory of rigidity of frameworks (graphs embedded in $d$-dimensional space) to consider nonlocal rigidity and flexibility properties. We provide conditions on a framework under which (I) as the framework flexes continuously it must remain inside a small ball, a property we call "almost-rigidity"; (II) any other framework with the same edge lengths must lie outside a much larger ball; (III) if the framework deforms by some given amount, its edge lengths change by a minimum amount; (IV) there is a nearby framework that is prestress stable, and thus rigid. The condition…
Let $X$ and $Y$ be length metric spaces. Let $\mathcal H^n$ denote the $n$-dimensional Hausdorff measure. The Lipschitz-Volume Rigidity is a property that if there exists a 1-Lipschitz map $f\colon X\to Y$ and $0<\mathcal H^n(X)=\mathcal H^n(f(X))<\infty$, then $f$ preserves the length of path. This property holds for smooth manifolds but doesn't hold for all singular spaces. We survey the Lipschitz-Volume Rigidity Theorems on singular spaces with lower curvature bounds and discuss some related open problems.
Consider a weighted, undirected graph cellularly embedded on a topological surface. The function assigning to each free homotopy class of closed curves the length of a shortest cycle within this homotopy class is called the marked length spectrum. The (unmarked) length spectrum is obtained by just listing the length values of the marked length spectrum in increasing order. In this paper, we describe algorithms for computing the (un)marked length spectra of graphs embedded on the torus. More specifically, we preprocess a weighted graph of complexity $n$ in time $O(n^2 \log \log n)$ so that, giv…
We develop a rigidity theory for bar-joint frameworks in Euclidean $d$-space in which specified classes of edges are allowed to change length in a coordinated fashion that requires differences of lengths to be preserved within each class. Rigidity for these coordinated frameworks is a generic property, and we characterize the rigid graphs in terms of redundant rigidity in the standard $d$-dimensional rigidity matroid. We also interpret our main results in terms of matroid unions.
Let $\mathbf{p}$ be a configuration of $n$ points in $\mathbb{R}^d$ for some $n$ and some $d \ge 2$. Each pair of points has a Euclidean length in the configuration. Given some graph $G$ on $n$ vertices, we measure the point-pair lengths corresponding to the edges of $G$. In this paper, we study the question of when a generic $\mathbf{p}$ in $d$ dimensions will be uniquely determined (up to an unknowable Euclidean transformation) from a given set of point-pair lengths together with knowledge of $d$ and $n$. In this setting the lengths are given simply as a set of real numbers; they are not lab…
