arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Alex Furman.
We study vanishing results for L2-cohomology of countable groups under the presence of subgroups that satisfy some weak normality condition. As a consequence we show that the L2-Betti numbers of SL(n,R) for any infinite integral domain R vanish below degree n-1. We also give a uniform proof for the vanishing of L2-Betti numbers of Thompson's groups F and T.
We study rigidity properties of lattices in hyperbolic n-space with n>2 and of surface groups in the context of (integrable) measure equivalence. The results for lattices in hyperbolic n-space with n>2 are generalizations of Mostow rigidity; they include a cocycle version of strong rigidity and an integrable measure equivalence classification. Despite the lack of Mostow rigidity for n=2 we show that cocompact lattices in SL(2,R) allow a similar integrable measure equivalence classification.
Consider homogeneous G/H and G/F, for an S-algebraic group G. A lattice Γ acts on the left strictly conservatively. The following rigidity results are obtained: morphisms, factors and joinings defined apriori only in the measurable category are in fact algebraically constrained. Arguing in an elementary fashion we manage to classify all the measurable Φ commuting with the Γ-action: assuming ergodicity, we find they are algebraically defined.
This note describes a unified approach to several superrigidity results, old and new, concerning representations of lattices into simple algebraic groups over local fields. For an arbitrary group $Γ$ and a $Γ$-boundary $B$ we associate certain generalized Weyl group $W_{Γ,B}$ and show that any representation with a Zariski dense unbounded image in a simple algebraic group, $ρ:Γ\to \mathbf{H}$, defines a special homomorphism $W_{Γ,B}\to {\rm Weyl}(\mathbf{H})$. This general fact allows to deduce the aforementioned superrigidity results.
The title refers to the area of research which studies infinite groups using measure-theoretic tools, and studies the restrictions that group structure imposes on ergodic theory of their actions. The paper is a survey of recent developments focused on the notion of Measure Equivalence between groups, and Orbit Equivalence between group actions. We discuss known invariants and classification results (rigidity) in both areas.
We identify the images of the comparision maps from ordinary homology and Sobolev homology, respectively, to the $l^1$-homology of a word-hyperbolic group with coefficients in complete normed modules. The underlying idea is that there is a subdivision procedure for singular chains in negatively curved spaces that is much more efficient (in terms of the $l^1$-norm) than barycentric subdivision. The results of this paper are an important ingredient in a forthcoming proof of the authors that hyperbolic lattices in dimension at least 3 are rigid with respect to integrable measure equivalence. Moreover, we prove a proportionality principle for the simplicial volume of negatively curved manifolds with regard to integrable measure equivalence.
We analyse volume-preserving actions of product groups on Riemannian manifolds. To this end, we establish a new superrigidity theorem for ergodic cocycles of product groups ranging in linear groups. There are no a priori assumptions on the acting groups, except a spectral gap assumption on their action. Our main application to manifolds concerns irreducible actions of Kazhdan product groups. We prove the following dichotomy: Either the action is infinitesimally linear, which means that the derivative cocycle arises from unbounded linear representations of all factors. Otherwise, the action is measurably isometric, in which case there are at most two factors in the product group. As a first application, this provides lower bounds on the dimension of the manifold in terms of the number of factors in the acting group. Another application is a strong restriction for actions of non-linear groups.
These notes contain an Ergodic-theoretic account of the Cocycle Superrigidity Theorem recently discovered by Sorin Popa. We state and prove a relative version of the result, discuss some applications to measurable equivalence relations, and point out that Gaussian actions (of ``rigid'' groups) satisfy the assumptions of Popa's theorem.
We propose a new approach to superrigidity phenomena and implement it for lattice representations and measurable cocycles with homeomorphisms of the circle as the target group. We are motivated by Ghys' theorem stating that any representation $\ro:Γ\to\Homeo_+(S^1)$ of an irreducible lattice $Γ$ in a semi-simple real Lie group $G$ of higher rank, either has a finite orbit or, up to a semi-conjugacy, extends to $G$ which acts through an epimorphism $G\to\PSL_{2}(\RR)$. Our approach, based on the study of abstract boundary theory and, specifically, on the notion of a generalized Weyl group, allows: (A) to prove a similar superrigidity result for irreducible lattices in products $G=G_{1}\times... G_{n}$ of $n\ge 2$ general locally compact groups, (B) to give a new (shorter) proof of Ghys' theorem, (C) to establish a commensurator superrigidity for general locally compact groups, (D) to prove first superrigidity theorems for $\tilde{A}_{2}$ groups. This approach generalizes to the setting of measurable circle bundles; in this context we prove cocycle versions of (A), (B) and (D). This is the first part of a broader project of studying superrigidity via generalized Weyl groups.
We consider the problems of measurable isomorphisms and joinings, measurable centralizers and quotients for certain classes of ergodic group actions on infinite measure spaces. Our main focus is on systems of algebraic origin: actions of lattices and other discrete subgroups on homogeneous spaces G/H where H is a sufficiently rich unimodular subgroup in a semi-simple group G. We also consider actions of discrete subgroups of isometries Isom(X) of a pinched negative curvature space X, acting on the space of horospheres Hor(X). For such systems we prove that the only measurable isomorphisms, joinings, quotients etc. are the obvious algebraic (or geometric) ones. This work was inspired by the previous work of Shalom and Steger, but uses completely different techniques which lead to more general results.
Let R a be countable ergodic equivalence relation of type II_1 on a standard probability space (X,m). The group Out(R) of outer automorphisms of R consists of all invertible Borel measure preserving maps of the space which map R-classes to R-classes modulo those which preserve almost every R-class. We analyze the group Out(R) for relations R generated by actions of higher rank lattices, providing general conditions on finiteness and triviality of Out(R) and explicitly computing this group for the standard actions. The method is based on Zimmer's superrigidity for measurable cocycles, Ratner's theorem and Gromov's Measure Equivalence construction.
In this paper the notion of Measure Equivalence (ME) of countable groups is studied. ME was introduced by Gromov as a measure-theoretic analog of quasi-isometries. All lattices in the same locally compact group are Measure Equivalent; this is one of the motivations for this notion. The main result of this paper is ME rigidity of higher rank lattices: any countable group which is ME to a lattice in a simple Lie group G of higher rank, is commensurable to a lattice in G.
Consider a countable group Gamma acting ergodically by measure preserving transformations on a probability space (X,mu), and let R_Gamma be the corresponding orbit equivalence relation on X. The following rigidity phenomenon is shown: there exist group actions such that the equivalence relation R_Gamma on X determines the group Gamma and the action (X,mu,Gamma) uniquely, up to finite groups. The natural action of SL_n(Z) on the n-torus R^n/Z^n, for n>2, is one of such examples. The interpretation of these results in the context of von Neumann algebras provides some support to the conjecture of Connes on rigidity of group algebras for groups with property T. Our rigidity results also give examples of countable equivalence relations of type II, which cannot be generated (mod 0) by a free action of any group. This gives a negative answer to a long standing problem of Feldman and Moore.