Manifold Atlas:A sample seed-page

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1 Definition and history

The simplicial volume is a homotopy invariant of oriented closed connected manifolds that was introduced by Gromov in his proof of Mostow rigidity [Munkholm1980][Gromov1982]. Intuitively, the simplicial volume measures how difficult it is to describe the manifold in question in terms of simplices (with real coefficients):

Definition 1.1. Let $M/var/www/vhost/map.mpim-bonn.mpg.de/tmp/AppWikiTex/tex_ZceCCf$$\newcommand{\Z}{\mathbb{Z}} \newcommand{\R}{\mathbb{R}} \newcommand{\C}{\mathbb{C}} \newcommand{\N}{\mathbb{N}} \newcommand{\Q}{\mathbb{Q}} \newcommand{\F}{\mathbb{F}} \newcommand{\bZ}{\mathbb{Z}} \newcommand{\bR}{\mathbb{R}} \newcommand{\bC}{\mathbb{C}} \newcommand{\bH}{\mathbb{H}} \newcommand{\bQ}{\mathbb{Q}} \newcommand{\bF}{\mathbb{F}} \newcommand{\bN}{\mathbb{N}} \DeclareMathOperator\id{id} % identity map \DeclareMathOperator\Sq{Sq} % Steenrod squares \DeclareMathOperator\Homeo{Homeo} % group of homeomorphisms of a topoloical space \DeclareMathOperator\Diff{Diff} % group of diffeomorphisms of a smooth manifold \DeclareMathOperator\SDiff{SDiff} % diffeomorphism under some constraint \DeclareMathOperator\Hom{Hom} % homomrphism group \DeclareMathOperator\End{End} % endomorphism group \DeclareMathOperator\Aut{Aut} % automorphism group \DeclareMathOperator\Inn{Inn} % inner automorphisms \DeclareMathOperator\Out{Out} % outer automorphism group \DeclareMathOperator\vol{vol} % volume \newcommand{\GL}{\text{GL}} % general linear group \newcommand{\SL}{\text{SL}} % special linear group \newcommand{\SO}{\text{SO}} % special orthogonal group \newcommand{\O}{\text{O}} % orthogonal group \newcommand{\SU}{\text{SU}} % special unitary group \newcommand{\Spin}{\text{Spin}} % Spin group \newcommand{\RP}{\Rr\mathrm P} % real projective space \newcommand{\CP}{\Cc\mathrm P} % complex projective space \newcommand{\HP}{\Hh\mathrm P} % quaternionic projective space \newcommand{\Top}{\mathrm{Top}} % topological category \newcommand{\PL}{\mathrm{PL}} % piecewise linear category \newcommand{\Cat}{\mathrm{Cat}} % any category \newcommand{\KS}{\text{KS}} % Kirby-Siebenmann class \newcommand{\Hud}{\text{Hud}} % Hudson torus \newcommand{\Ker}{\text{Ker}} % Kernel \newcommand{\underbar}{\underline} %Classifying Spaces for Families of Subgroups \newcommand{\textup}{\text} \newcommand{\sp}{^}M$ be an oriented closed connected manifold of dimension $n$$n$. Then the simplicial volume (also called Gromov norm) of $M$$M$ is defined as

$\displaystyle \|M\| := \inf \bigl\{ \|c\|_1 \bigm| \text{$c \in C_n(M;\mathbb{R})$ is a fundamental cycle of $M$} \bigr\} \in \mathbb{R}_{\geq 0}.$ $$\displaystyle \|M\| := \inf \bigl\{ \|c\|_1 \bigm| \text{$c \in C_n(M;\mathbb{R})$ is a fundamental cycle of $M$} \bigr\} \in \mathbb{R}_{\geq 0}.$$

Here, $C_*(M;\mathbb{R})$$C_*(M;\mathbb{R})$ denotes the singular chain complex of $M$$M$ with real coefficients, and $\|\cdot\|_1$$\|\cdot\|_1$ denotes the $\ell^1$$\ell^1$-norm on the singular chain complex induced from the (unordered) basis given by all singular simplices; i.e., for a chain $c=\sum_{j=0}^k a_j \cdot \sigma_j \in C_*(M;\mathbb{R})$$c=\sum_{j=0}^k a_j \cdot \sigma_j \in C_*(M;\mathbb{R})$ (in reduced form), the $\ell^1$$\ell^1$-norm of $c$$c$ is given by

$\displaystyle \|c\|_1 := \sum_{j=0}^k |a_j|.$ $$\displaystyle \|c\|_1 := \sum_{j=0}^k |a_j|.$$

2 References

• [Gromov1982] M. Gromov, Volume and bounded cohomology, Inst. Hautes Études Sci. Publ. Math. (1982), no.56, 5–99 (1983). MR686042 (84h:53053) Zbl 0516.53046
• [Munkholm1980] H. J. Munkholm, Simplices of maximal volume in hyperbolic space, Gromov's norm, and Gromov's proof of Mostow's rigidity theorem (following Thurston), 788 (1980), 109–124. MR585656 (81k:53046) Zbl 0434.57017