We show that the fundamental groups of any two closed irreducible non-geometric graph-manifolds are quasi-isometric. This answers a question of Kapovich and Leeb. We also classify the quasi-isometry types of fundamental groups of graph-manifolds with boundary in terms of certain finite two-colored graphs. A corollary is the quasi-isometry classification of Artin groups whose presentation graphs are trees. In particular any two right-angled Artin groups whose presentation graphs are trees of diameter at least 3 are quasi-isometric, answering a question of Bestvina; further, this quasi-isometry class does not include any other right-angled Artin groups.
We describe the quasi-isometric classification of fundamental groups of irreducible non-geometric 3-manifolds which do not have "too many" arithmetic hyperbolic geometric components, thus completing the quasi-isometric classification of 3--manifold groups in all but a few exceptional cases.
We prove that if $G$ is a non-uniform lattice in a rank-one semi-simple Lie group $\ne Isom(\H^2_\R)$ then $G$ is quasi-isometrically co-Hopf. This means that every quasi-isometric embedding $G\to G$ is coarsely onto and thus is a quasi-isometry.
We prove that PSL(2,Z[1/p]) gives the first example of groups which are not quasi-isometric to each other but have the same quasi-isometry group. Namely, PSL(2,Z[1/p]) and PSL(2,Z[1/q]) are not quasi-isometric unless p=q, and, independent of p, the quasi-isometry group of PSL(2,Z[1/p]) is PSL(2,Q). In addition, we characterize PSL(2,Z[1/p]) uniquely among all finitely generated groups by its quasi-isometry type.
Two groups are virtually isomorphic if they can be obtained one from the other via a finite number of steps, where each step consists in taking a finite extension or a finite index subgroup (or viceversa). Virtually isomorphic groups are always quasi-isometric, and a group G is quasi-isometrically rigid if every group quasi-isometric to G is virtually isomorphic to G. In this survey we describe quasi-isometric rigidity results for fundamental groups of manifolds which can be decomposed into geometric pieces. After stating by now classical results on lattices in semisimple Lie groups, we focus …
We characterize groups quasi-isometric to a right-angled Artin group $G$ with finite outer automorphism group. In particular all such groups admit a geometric action on a $CAT(0)$ cube complex that has an equivariant "fibering" over the Davis building of $G$.
Let BS(1,n)= < a,b: aba^{-1}=b^n >. We prove that any finitely-generated group quasi-isometric to BS(1,n) is (up to finite groups) isomorphic to BS(1,n). We also show that any uniform group of quasisimilarities of the real line is bilipschitz conjugate to an affine group.
We construct examples of quasi-isometric embeddings of word hyperbolic groups into $\mathsf{SL}(d,\mathbb{R})$ for $d \geqslant 5$ which are not limits of Anosov representations into $\mathsf{SL}(d,\mathbb{R})$. As a consequence, we conclude that an analogue of the density theorem for $\mathsf{PSL}(2,\mathbb{C})$ does not hold for $\mathsf{SL}(d,\mathbb{R})$ when $d \geqslant 5$.
We show that a large class of right-angled Artin groups (in particular, those with planar complementary defining graph) can be embedded quasi-isometrically in pure braid groups and in the group of area preserving diffeomorphisms of the disk fixing the boundary (with respect to the $L^2$-norm metric); this extends results of Benaim and Gambaudo who gave quasi-isometric embeddings of $F\_n$ and $\Z^n$ for all $n>0$. As a consequence we are also able to embed a variety of Gromov hyperbolic groups quasi-isometrically in pure braid groups and in the diffeomorphism group of the disk. Examples includ…
In these lecture notes, we combine recent homological methods of Kevin Whyte with older dynamical methods developed by Benson Farb and myself, to obtain a new quasi-isometric rigidity theorem for the mapping class group MCG(S) of a once punctured surface S of genus at least 2: if K is a finitely generated group quasi-isometric to MCG(S) then there is a homomorphism K -> MCG(S) with finite kernel and finite index image. This theorem is joint with Kevin Whyte.
Let S be an oriented surface of finite type of genus g with m punctures and where 3g-3+m>1. We show that the mapping class group M(S) of S is quasi-isometrically rigid. We also give a different proof of the following result of Behrstock and Minsky: The homological dimension of the asmyptotic cone of M(S) of S equals 3g-3+m.
We construct quasi-isometric embeddings from right-angled Artin groups into the outer automorphism group of a free group. These homomorphisms are in analogy with those constructed in \cite{CLM}, where the target group is the mapping class group of a surface. Toward this goal, we develop tools in the free group setting that mirror those for surface groups as well as discuss various analogs of subsurface projection; these may be of independent interest.
In this paper it is proved that relative hyperbolicity is an invariant of quasi-isometry. As a byproduct of the arguments, simplified definitions of relative hyperbolicity are obtained. In particular we obtain a new definition very similar to the one of hyperbolicity, relying on the existence for every quasi-geodesic triangle of a central left coset of peripheral subgroup.
Following the work of Rosendal and Mann and Rafi, we try to answer the following question: when is the mapping class group of an infinite-type surface quasi-isometric to a graph whose vertices are curves on that surface? With the assumption of tameness as defined by Mann and Rafi, we describe a necessary and sufficient condition, called translatability, for a geometrically nontrivial big mapping class group to admit such a quasi-isometry. In addition, we show that the mapping class group of the plane minus a Cantor set is quasi-isometric to the loop graph defined by Bavard, which we believe re…
In this note we give the quasi-isometry classification for a class of right angled Artin groups. In particular, we obtain the first such classification for a class of Artin groups with dimension larger than 2; our families exist in every dimension.
A simple surface amalgam is the union of a finite collection of surfaces with precisely one boundary component each and which have their boundary curves identified. We prove if two fundamental groups of simple surface amalgams act properly and cocompactly by isometries on the same proper geodesic metric space, then the groups are commensurable. Consequently, there are infinitely many fundamental groups of simple surface amalgams that are quasi-isometric, but which do not act properly and cocompactly on the same proper geodesic metric space.
In this paper we explore coarse properties of cusp-decomposable manifolds first defined by Nguyên Phan. We describe the large scale geometry of the universal cover of a cusp-decomposable manifold and of quasi-isometries between two such universal covers. This description will provide us the tools to prove quasi-isometric rigidity for fundamental groups of cusp-decomposable manifolds.
We introduce a topological invariant, it a type of a graph-manifold, which takes natural values. For a 4-dimensional graph-manifold, whose type does not exceed two, it is proved that its universal cover is bi-Lipschitz equivalent to a universal cover of an orthogonal graph-manifold (for any Riemannian metrics on graph-manifolds).
A cusp-decomposable manifold is a manifold constructed from a finite number of complete, negatively curved, finite volume manifolds and identifying the boundaries of truncated cusps by diffeomorphisms. Using properties of the electric space of the universal cover of cusp-decomposable manifolds, we show that the inclusion of walls and pieces induces quasi-isometric embeddings. We also show that isomorphisms between fundamental groups of higher graph manifolds preserve the decomposition into pieces.
In this paper, we prove that certain spaces are not quasi-isometric to Cayley graphs of finitely generated groups. In particular, we answer a question of Woess and prove a conjecture of Diestel and Leader by showing that certain homogeneous graphs are not quasi-isometric to a Cayley graph of a finitely generated group. This paper is the first in a sequence of papers proving results announced in [EFW0]. In particular, this paper contains many steps in the proofs of quasi-isometric rigidity of lattices in Sol and of the quasi-isometry classification of lamplighter groups. The proofs of those res…
In every dimension $n\ge 3$ we introduce a class of orthogonal graph-manifolds and prove that the fundamental group of any orthogonal graph-manifold quasi-isometrically embeds into a product of $n$ trees. As a consequence, we obtain that asymptotic and linearly-controlled asymptotic dimensions of such group are equal to $n$.
Let M be a smooth compact connected oriented manifold of dimension at least two endowed with a volume form. Assuming certain conditions on the fundamental group $π_1(M)$ we construct quasi-isometric embeddings of either free Abelian or direct products of non-Abelian free groups into the group of volume preserving diffeomorphisms of M equipped with the L^p metric induced by a Riemannian metric on M.
Let $G$ and $H$ be quasi-isometric finitely generated groups and let $P\leq G$; is there a subgroup $Q$ (or a collection of subgroups) of $H$ whose left cosets coarsely reflect the geometry of the left cosets of $P$ in $G$? We explore sufficient conditions for a positive answer. The article consider pairs of the form $(G,\mathcal{P})$ where $G$ is a finitely generated group and $\mathcal{P}$ a finite collection of subgroups, there is a notion of quasi-isometry of pairs, and quasi-isometrically characteristic collection of subgroups. A subgroup is qi-characteristic if it belongs to a qi-charact…
Every open manifold L of dimension greater than one has complete Riemannian metrics g with bounded geometry such that (L,g) is not quasi-isometric to a leaf of a codimension one foliation of a closed manifold. Hence no conditions on the local geometry of (L,g) suffice to make it quasi-isometric to a leaf of such a foliation. We introduce the `bounded homology property', a semi-local property of (L,g) that is necessary for it to be a leaf in a compact manifold in codimension one, up to quasi-isometry. An essential step involves a partial generalization of the Novikov closed leaf theorem to high…
We prove that if X is a complete geodesic metric space with uniformly generated first homology group and $f: X\to R$ is metrically proper on the connected components and bornologous, then X is quasi-isometric to a tree. Using this and adapting the definition of hyperbolic approximation we obtain an intrinsic sufficent condition for a metric space to be PQ-symmetric to an ultrametric space.
This note describes sharp Milnor--Wood inequalities for the Euler number of flat oriented vector bundles over closed Riemannian manifolds locally isometric to products of hyperbolic planes. One consequence is that such manifolds do not admit an affine structure, confirming Chern--Sullivan's conjecture in this case. The manifolds under consideration are of particular interest, since in contrary to many other locally symmetric spaces they do admit flat vector bundle of the corresponding dimension. When the manifold is irreducible and of higher rank, it is shown that flat oriented vector bundles …
We construct infinitely many examples of pairs of isospectral but non-isometric $1$-cusped hyperbolic $3$-manifolds. These examples have infinite discrete spectrum and the same Eisenstein series. Our constructions are based on an application of Sunada's method in the cusped setting, and so in addition our pairs are finite covers of the same degree of a 1-cusped hyperbolic 3-orbifold (indeed manifold) and also have the same complex length-spectra. Finally we prove that any finite volume hyperbolic 3-manifold isospectral to the figure-eight knot complement is homeomorphic to the figure-eight kno…
It is known that PQ-symmetric maps on the boundary characterize the quasi-isometry type of visual hyperbolic spaces, in particular, of geodesically complete \br-trees. We define a map on pairs of PQ-symmetric ultrametric spaces which characterizes the branching of the space. We also show that, when the ultrametric spaces are the corresponding end spaces, this map defines a metric between rooted geodesically complete simplicial trees with minimal vertex degree 3 in the same quasi-isometry class. Moreover, this metric measures how far are the trees from being rooted isometric.
This paper is a more succinct version of the author's 1993 UCLA mathematics thesis. It proves that any group quasi-isometric to the product of the hyperbolic plane with the real line is a finite extension of a cocompact lattice in either the isometry group of the product of the hyperbolic plane with the real line or the isometry group of the universal cover of SL(2,R).
This (quasi-)survey addresses the quasi-isometry classification of locally compact groups, with an emphasis on amenable hyperbolic locally compact groups. This encompasses the problem of quasi-isometry classification of homogeneous negatively curved manifolds. A main conjecture provides a general description; an extended discussion reduces this conjecture to more specific statements. In the course of the paper, we provide statements of quasi-isometric rigidity for general symmetric spaces of noncompact type and also discuss accessibility issues in the realm of compactly generated locally compa…
We prove the equivalence between a relative bottleneck property and being quasi-isometric to a tree-graded space. As a consequence, we deduce that the quasi-trees of spaces defined axiomatically by Bestvina-Bromberg-Fujiwara are quasi-isometric to tree-graded spaces. Using this we prove that mapping class groups quasi-isometrically embed into a finite product of simplicial trees. In particular, these groups have finite Assouad-Nagata dimension, direct embeddings exhibiting $\ell^p$ compression exponent $1$ for all $p\geq 1$ and they quasi-isometrically embed into $\ell^1(\mathbb N)$. We deduce…
Almost-isometries are quasi-isometries with multiplicative constant one. Lifting a pair of metrics on a compact space gives quasi-isometric metrics on the universal cover. Under some additional hypotheses on the metrics, we show that there is no almost-isometry between the universal covers. We show that Riemannian manifolds which are almost-isometric have the same volume growth entropy. We establish various rigidity results as applications.
In this note, we announce the first results on quasi-isometric rigidity of non-nilpotent polycyclic groups. In particular, we prove that any group quasi-isometric to the three dimenionsional solvable Lie group Sol is virtually a lattice in Sol. We prove analogous results for groups quasi-isometric to $R \ltimes R^n$ where the semidirect product is defined by a diagonalizable matrix of determinant one with no eigenvalues on the unit circle. Our approach to these problems is to first classify all self quasi-isometries of the solvable Lie group. Our classification of self quasi-isometries for $R …
We present the notion of asymptotically large depth for a metric space which is (a priory) weaker than having subexponential asymptotic dimension growth and (a priory) stronger than property A.
In this article we construct closed, isospectral, non-isometric locally symmetric manifolds. We have three main results. First, we construct arbitrarily large sets of closed, isospectral, non-isometric manifolds. Second, we show the growth of size these sets of isospectral manifolds as a function of volume is super-polynomial. Finally, we construct pairs of infinite towers of finite covers of a closed manifold that are isospectral and non-isometric at each stage.
Let G and F be finitely generated groups with infinitely many ends and let A and B be graph of groups decompositions of F and G such that all edge groups are finite and all vertex groups have at most one end. We show that G and F are quasi-isometric if and only if every one-ended vertex group of A is quasi-isometric to some one-ended vertex group of B and every one-ended vertex group of B is quasi-isometric to some one-ended vertex group of A. From our proof it also follows that if G is any finitely generated group, of order at least three, the groups: G*G, G*Z,G*G*G and G* Z/2Z are all quasi-…
