arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Michael Farber.
It is shown that the Novikov inequalities for critical points of closed 1-forms hold with the von Neumann Betti numbers replacing the Novikov numbers. As a corollary we obtain a vanishing theorem for $L^2$ cohomology, generalizing a theorem of W. Lueck. We also prove that von Neumann Betti numbers coincide with the Novikov numbers for free abelian coverings.
In this paper we use the results of our previous work in order to compute the phase of the torsion of an Euler structure in terms of its characteristic class. Also, we introduce here a new notion of an absolute torsion, which does not require a choice of any additional topological information (like an Euler structure). We prove that in the case of closed 3-manifolds obtained by 0-framed surgery on a classical knot the absolute torsion is equivalent to the Conway polynomial. Hence the absolute torsion can be viewed as a high-dimensional generalization of the Conway polynomial.
In this note I use cup-products and higher Massey products to find topological lower bounds on the number of geometrically distinct critical points of any closed 1-form in a given cohomology class.
It is shown that the signature of a manifold with a symplectic circle action having only isolated fixed points, equals the alternating sum of the Novikov numbers corresponding to the cohomology class of the generalized moment map. The same is true for more general fixed point sets.
In this paper we define a Poincaré-Reidemeister scalar product on the determinant line of the cohomology of any flat vector bundle over a closed orientable odd-dimensional manifold. It is a combinatorial "torsion-type" invariant which refines the PR-metric, introduced earlier by the first author, and contains an additional sign or phase information. We compute the PR-scalar product in terms of the torsions of Euler structures, introduced earlier by the second author. We show that the sign of our PR-scalar product is determined by the Stiefel-Whitney classes and the semi-characteristic of the manifold. As an application, we compute the Ray-Singer analytic torsion via the torsions of Euler structures. Another application: a computation of the twisted semi-characteristic in terms of the Stiefel-Whitney classes.
As is well-known, the Witten deformation of the De Rham complex computes the De Rham cohomology. In this paper we study the Witten deformation on a noncompact manifold and restrict it to differential forms which behave polynomially near infinity. Such polynomial differential forms naturally appear on manifolds with a cylindrical structure. We prove that the cohomology of the Witten deformation acting on the complex of the polynomially growing forms can be computed as the relative cohomology of the manifold with respect to the negative remote fiber of the function. We show that the assumptions of our main theorem are satisfied in a number of interesting special cases, including generic real polynomials.
We consider the problem of whether it is possible to improve the Novikov inequalities for closed 1-forms, or any other inequalities of a similar nature, if we assume, additionally, that the given 1-form is harmonic with respect to some Riemannian metric. We show that, under suitable assumptions, it is impossible. We use, in an essential way, a theorem of E.Calabi characterizing 1-forms which are harmonic with respect to some metric. We also study some interesting examples illustrating our results.
In this paper we study the problem of approximation of the $L^2$-topological invariants by their finite dimensional analogues. We obtain generalizations of the theorem of Lück, dealing with towers of finitely sheeted normal coverings. We prove approximation theorems, establishing relations between the homological invariants, corresponding to infinite dimensional representations and sequences of finite dimensional representations, assuming that their normalized characters converge. Also, we find an approximation theorem for residually finite $p$-groups ($p$ is a prime), where we use the homology with coefficients in a finite field $\fp$. We view sequences of finite dimensional flat bundles of growing dimension as examples of growth processes. We study a von Neumann category with a Dixmier type trace, which allows to describe the asymptotic invariants of growth processes. We introduce a new invariant of torsion objects, the torsion dimension. We show that the torsion dimension appears in general as an additional correcting term in the approximation theorems; it vanishes under some arithmeticity assumptions. We also show that the torsion dimension allows to establish non-triviality of the Grothendieck group of torsion objects.
Given a holomorphic Hilbertian bundle on a compact complex manifold, we introduce the notion of holomorphic $L^2$ torsion, which lies in the determinant line of the twisted $L^2$ Dolbeault cohomology and represents a volume element there. Here we utilise the theory of determinant lines of Hilbertian modules over finite von Neumann algebras as developed in an earlier paper by the authors. This specialises to the Ray-Singer-Quillen holomorphic torsion in the finite dimensional case. We compute a metric variation formula for the holomorphic $L^2$ torsion, which shows that it is not in general independent of the choice of Hermitian metrics on the complex manifold and on the holomorphic Hilbertian bundle, which are needed to define it. We therefore initiate the theory of correspondences of determinant lines, that enables us to define a relative holomorphic $L^2$ torsion for a pair of flat Hilbertian bundles, which we prove is independent of the choice of Hermitian metrics on the complex manifold and on the flat Hilbertian bundles.
In this paper we suggest a new general formalism for studying the invariants of polyhedra and manifolds comming from the theory of von Neumann algebras. First, we examine generality in which one may apply the construction of the extended abelian category, which was suggested in the previous publications of the author, using the ideas of P.Freyd. This leads to the notions of a finite von Neumann category and of a trace on such category. Given a finite von Neumann category, we study the extended homology and cohomology theories with values in the abelian extension. Any trace on the initial category produces numerical invariants - the von Neumann dimension and the Novikov - Shubin numbers. Thus, we obtain the local versions of the Novikov - Shubin invariants, localized at different traces. In the "abelian" case this localization can be made more geometric: we show that any torsion object determines a "divisor" -- a closed subspace of the space of the parameters. The divisors of torsion objects together with the information produced by the local Novikov - Shubin invariants may be used to study multiplicities of intersections of algebraic and analytic varieties (we discuss here only simple examples demonstrating this possibility). We compute explicitly the divisors and the von Neumann dimensions of the extended cohomology in the real analytic situation. We also give general formulae for the extended cohomology of a mapping torus. Finally, we show how one can define a De Rham version of the extended cohomology and prove a De Rham type theorem.
It is shown that the topological phenomenon "zero in the continuous spectrum", discovered by S.P.Novikov and M.A.Shubin, can be explained in terms of a homology theory on the category of finite polyhedra with values in certain abelian category. This approach implies homotopy invariance of the Novikov-Shubin invariants. Its main advantage is that it allows to use the standard homological techniques, such as spectral sequences, derived functors, universal coefficients etc., while studying the Novikov-Shubin invariants. It also leads to some new quantitative invariants, measuring the Novikov-Shubin phenomenon in a different way, which are used in order to strengthen the Morse type inequalities of Novikov and Shubin.
It is shown that for any piecewise-linear closed orientable manifold of odd dimension there exists an invariantly defined metric on the determinant line of cohomology with coefficients in an arbitrary flat bundle E over the manifold (E is not required to be unimodular). The construction of this metric (called Poincare - Reidemeister metric) is purely combinatorial; it combines the standard Reidemeister type construction with Poincare duality. The main result of the paper states that the Poincare-Reidemeister metric computes combinatorially the Ray-Singer metric. It is shown also that the Ray-Singer metrics on some relative determinant lines can be computed combinatorially (including the even-dimensional case) in terms of metrics determined by correspondences.
We establish an equivariant generalization of the Novikov inequalities which allow to estimate the topology of the set of critical points of a closed basic invariant 1-form by means of twisted equivariant cohomology of the manifold. We test and apply our inequalities in the case of a finite group. As an application we obtain Novikov type inequalities for a manifold with boundary.
We generalize the Novikov inequalities for 1-forms in two different directions: first, we allow non-isolated critical points (assuming that they are non-degenerate in the sense of R.Bott), and, secondly, we strengthen the inequalities by means of twisting by an arbitrary flat bundle. We also obtain an $L^2$ version of these inequalities with finite von Neumann algebras. The proof of the main theorem uses Bismut's modification of the Witten deformation of the de Rham complex; it is based on an explicit estimate on the lower part of the spectrum of the corresponding Laplacian.
We generalize the Novikov inequalities for 1-forms in two different directions: first, we allow non-isolated critical points (assuming that they are non-degenerate in the sense of R.Bott), and, secondly, we strengthen the inequalities by means of twisting by an arbitrary flat bundle. The proof uses Bismut's modification of the Witten deformation of the de Rham complex; it is based on an explicit estimate on the lower part of the spectrum of the corresponding Laplacian. In particular, we obtain a new analytic proof of the degenerate Morse inequalities of Bott.