Systole, inradius and rigidity of cusped hyperbolic 3-manifolds

Abstract

We establish optimal inequalities relating the systole and the inradius to the volume of finite-volume hyperbolic 3-manifolds. In the cusped orientable case, we refine a theorem of Gendulphe by proving a sharp systole-volume inequality whose unique extremal manifold is the figure-eight knot complement. Excluding the figure-eight knot complement, we obtain a stronger inequality whose extremal manifold is the sister of the figure-eight knot complement. We also establish analogous optimal systole-volume inequalities for closed orientable hyperbolic 3-manifolds, where the extremal manifolds are the Weeks-Matveev-Fomenko manifold, the manifold Vol3, and the Meyerhoff manifold. In the second part of the article, we study the inradius. We prove optimal inradius-volume inequalities for orientable and nonorientable cusped hyperbolic 3-manifolds, identifying respectively the sister of the figure-eight knot complement and the Gieseking manifold as the extremal cases. We also prove that the Gieseking manifold is the unique cusped hyperbolic 3-manifold of minimal inradius, thereby completing a result of Gendulphe, who had previously established the corresponding lower bound.