Geodesic flows with positive topological entropy, twist maps and hyperbolicity (Q601858): Difference between revisions

Given any closed manifold of dimension at least 2, the author shows that any \(C^\infty\)-Riemannian metric on it can be \(C^2\)-perturbed to a Riemannian metric with positive topological entropy. More precisely, he proves that the set of \(C^\infty\)-Riemannian metrics contains an open and dense subset \(R\) in the \(C^2\)-topology such that for each Riemannian metric \(g\) in \(R\) the associated geodesic flow contains a nontrivial hyperbolic basic set. This implies that the topological entropy of \(g\) is positive and the number of closed geodesics grows exponentially with their period. This paper generalizes the methods from [\textit{G. P. Paternain} and the author, J. Differ. Geom. 61, No. 1, 1--49 (2002; Zbl 1048.53061)].