arXiv subjects

Matthew Badger

Publications and source records attributed to Matthew Badger.

30 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2017

Rectifiability and elliptic measures on 1-sided NTA domains with Ahlfors-David regular boundaries

Let $Ω\subset \mathbb{R}^{n+1}$, $n\geq 2$, be 1-sided NTA domain (aka uniform domain), i.e. a domain which satisfies interior Corkscrew and Harnack Chain conditions, and assume that $\partialΩ$ is $n$-dimensional Ahlfors-David regular. We characterize the rectifiability of $\partialΩ$ in terms of the absolute continuity of surface measure with respect to harmonic measure. We also show that these are equivalent to the fact that $\partialΩ$ can be covered $\mathcal{H}^n$-a.e. by a countable union of portions of boundaries of bounded chord-arc subdomains of $Ω$ and to the fact that $\partialΩ$ possesses exterior corkscrew points in a qualitative way $\mathcal{H}^n$-a.e. Our methods apply to harmonic measure and also to elliptic measures associated with real symmetric second order divergence form elliptic operators with locally Lipschitz coefficients whose derivatives satisfy a natural qualitative Carleson condition.

math.CA↗

arXiv2017

Structure of sets which are well approximated by zero sets of harmonic polynomials

The zero sets of harmonic polynomials play a crucial role in the study of the free boundary regularity problem for harmonic measure. In order to understand the fine structure of these free boundaries a detailed study of the singular points of these zero sets is required. In this paper we study how "degree $k$ points" sit inside zero sets of harmonic polynomials in $\mathbb R^n$ of degree $d$ (for all $n\geq 2$ and $1\leq k\leq d$) and inside sets that admit arbitrarily good local approximations by zero sets of harmonic polynomials. We obtain a general structure theorem for the latter type of sets, including sharp Hausdorff and Minkowski dimension estimates on the singular set of "degree $k$ points" ($k\geq 2$) without proving uniqueness of blowups or aid of PDE methods such as monotonicity formulas. In addition, we show that in the presence of a certain topological separation condition, the sharp dimension estimates improve and depend on the parity of $k$. An application is given to the two-phase free boundary regularity problem for harmonic measure below the continuous threshold introduced by Kenig and Toro.

math.CA↗

arXiv2017

Multiscale analysis of 1-rectifiable measures II: characterizations

A measure is 1-rectifiable if there is a countable union of finite length curves whose complement has zero measure. We characterize 1-rectifiable Radon measures $μ$ in $n$-dimensional Euclidean space for all $n\geq 2$ in terms of positivity of the lower density and finiteness of a geometric square function, which loosely speaking, records in an $L^2$ gauge the extent to which $μ$ admits approximate tangent lines, or has rapidly growing density ratios, along its support. In contrast with the classical theorems of Besicovitch, Morse and Randolph, and Moore, we do not assume an a priori relationship between $μ$ and 1-dimensional Hausdorff measure. We also characterize purely 1-unrectifiable Radon measures, i.e. locally finite measures that give measure zero to every finite length curve. Characterizations of this form were originally conjectured to exist by P. Jones. Along the way, we develop an $L^2$ variant of P. Jones' traveling salesman construction, which is of independent interest.

math.MG↗

arXiv2015

Two sufficient conditions for rectifiable measures

We identify two sufficient conditions for locally finite Borel measures on $\mathbb{R}^n$ to give full mass to a countable family of Lipschitz images of $\mathbb{R}^m$. The first condition, extending a prior result of Pajot, is a sufficient test in terms of $L^p$ affine approximability for a locally finite Borel measure $μ$ on $\mathbb{R}^n$ satisfying the global regularity hypothesis $$\limsup_{r\downarrow 0} μ(B(x,r))/r^m <\infty\quad \text{at $μ$-a.e. $x\in\mathbb{R}^n$}$$ to be $m$-rectifiable in the sense above. The second condition is an assumption on the growth rate of the 1-density that ensures a locally finite Borel measure $μ$ on $\mathbb{R}^n$ with $$\lim_{r\downarrow 0} μ(B(x,r))/r=\infty\quad\text{at $μ$-a.e. $x\in\mathbb{R}^n$}$$ is 1-rectifiable.

math.CA↗

arXiv2014

Local set approximation: Mattila-Vuorinen type sets, Reifenberg type sets, and tangent sets

We investigate the interplay between the local and asymptotic geometry of a set $A \subseteq \mathbb{R}^n$ and the geometry of model sets $\mathcal{S} \subset \mathcal{P}(\mathbb{R}^n)$, which approximate $A$ locally uniformly on small scales. The framework for local set approximation developed in this paper unifies and extends ideas of Jones, Mattila and Vuorinen, Reifenberg, and Preiss. We indicate several applications of this framework to variational problems that arise in geometric measure theory and partial differential equations. For instance, we show that the singular part of the support of an $(n-1)$-dimensional asymptotically optimally doubling measure in $\mathbb{R}^n$ ($n\geq 4$) has upper Minkowski dimension at most $n-4$.

math.CA↗

arXiv2014

Multiscale analysis of 1-rectifiable measures: necessary conditions

We repurpose tools from the theory of quantitative rectifiability to study the qualitative rectifiability of measures in $\Bbb{R}^n$, $n\geq 2$. To each locally finite Borel measure $μ$, we associate a function $\widetilde J_2(μ, x)$ which uses a weighted sum to record how closely the mass of $μ$ is concentrated on a line in the triples of dyadic cubes containing $x$. We show that $\widetilde J_2(μ, x) < \infty$ $μ$-a.e. is a necessary condition for $μ$ to give full mass to a countable family of rectifiable curves. This confirms a conjecture of Peter Jones from 2000. A novelty of this result is that no assumption is made on the upper Hausdorff density of the measure. Thus we are able to analyze generic 1-rectifiable measures that are mutually singular with the 1-dimensional Hausdorff measure.

math.CA↗

arXiv2014

Quasiconformal planes with bi-Lipschitz pieces and extensions of almost affine maps

A quasiplane $f(V)$ is the image of an $n$-dimensional Euclidean subspace $V$ of ${\Bbb R}^N$ ($1\leq n\leq N-1$) under a quasiconformal map $f:{\Bbb R}^N\to{\Bbb R}^N$ . We give sufficient conditions in terms of the weak quasisymmetry constant of the underlying map for a quasiplane to be a bi-Lipschitz $n$-manifold and for a quasiplane to have big pieces of bi-Lipschitz images of ${\Bbb R}^n$. One main novelty of these results is that we analyze quasiplanes in arbitrary codimension $N-n$. To establish the big pieces criterion, we prove new extension theorems for "almost affine" maps, which are of independent interest. This work is related to investigations by Tukia and Väisälä on extensions of quasisymmetric maps with small distortion.

math.CA↗

arXiv2012

Beurling's criterion and extremal metrics for Fuglede modulus

We formulate a necessary and sufficient condition for an admissible metric to be extremal for the Fuglede p-modulus of a system of measures. When p=2, this characterization generalizes Beurling's criterion, a sufficient condition for an admissible metric to be extremal for the extremal length of a planar curve family. In addition, we prove that every non-negative Borel function in R^n with positive and finite p-norm is extremal for the p-modulus of some curve family.

math.CA↗

arXiv2012

Quasisymmetry and rectifiability of quasispheres

We obtain Dini conditions with "exponent 2" that guarantee that an asymptotically conformal quasisphere is rectifiable. In particular, we show that for any e>0 integrability of (esssup_{1-t < |x| < 1+t} K_f(x)-1)^{2-e} dt/t implies that the image of the unit sphere under a global quasiconformal homeomorphism f is rectifiable. We also establish estimates for the weak quasisymmetry constant of a global K-quasiconformal map in neighborhoods with maximal dilatation close to 1.

math.CA↗

arXiv2012

Flat points in zero sets of harmonic polynomials and harmonic measure from two sides

We obtain quantitative estimates of local flatness of zero sets of harmonic polynomials. There are two alternatives: at every point either the zero set stays uniformly far away from a hyperplane in the Hausdorff distance at all scales or the zero set becomes locally flat on small scales with arbitrarily small constant. An application is given to a free boundary problem for harmonic measure from two sides, where blow-ups of the boundary are zero sets of harmonic polynomials.

math.CA↗

arXiv2010

Null sets of harmonic measure on NTA domains: Lipschitz approximation revisited

We show the David-Jerison construction of big pieces of Lipschitz graphs inside a corkscrew domain does not require its surface measure be upper Ahlfors regular. Thus we can study absolute continuity of harmonic measure and surface measure on NTA domains of locally finite perimeter using Lipschitz approximations. A partial analogue of the F. and M. Riesz Theorem for simply connected planar domains is obtained for NTA domains in space. As a consequence every Wolff snowflake has infinite surface measure.

math.CA↗

arXiv2009

Harmonic polynomials and tangent measures of harmonic measure

We show that on an NTA domain if each tangent measure to harmonic measure at a point is a polynomial harmonic measure then the associated polynomials are homogeneous. Geometric information for solutions of a two-phase free boundary problem studied by Kenig and Toro is derived.

math.AP↗