Trace Systoles and Sink Constant

Abstract

Let $\Sigma$ be a surface with $\chi (\Sigma) < 0$, and a representation $\rho $ from the fundamental group $\pi_1 (\Sigma)$ into $ \rm{SL} (2 , \mathbb{C})$. We define the \emph{trace systole} of $\rho$, denoted $\mathrm{tys} (\rho)$ as folows : $$\mathrm{tys} (\rho) = \inf \left\{ | \rm{tr} (\rho (\gamma)) | \ , \ \gamma \in \pi_1 (S) \mbox{ essential simple closed curve} \right\}$$ When $\Sigma$ is endowed with an hyperbolic structure, the trace systole of the holonomy representation is naturally related to the usual systolic length of the hyperbolic surface, which is one of the motivation for this study. The function $\mathrm{tys}$ is bounded on relative character varieties of $\Sigma$, and in this article we compute explicitly the optimal bounds for the one-holed torus, the four-holed sphere and the non-orientable surface of genus $3$. The proofs rely on the correspondance between representations of these surface groups and so-called Markoff maps which were introduced by Bowditch. From this, we infer various consequences on the optimal systolic inequalities of certain hyperbolic manifolds and also on non-Fuchsian representations for these surfaces.