Intrinsic random walks and sub-Laplacians in sub-Riemannian geometry (Q2357467)

In this article, the authors discuss the questions, which seem to be pointed out first by \textit{R. W. Brockett} [in: Proc. Int. Congr. Math., Warszawa 1983, Vol. 2, 1357--1368 (1984; Zbl 0559.93042)] and by \textit{R. Montgomery} [A tour of subriemannian geometries, their geodesics and applications. Providence, RI: American Mathematical Society (AMS) (2002; Zbl 1044.53022)]: How can we define an intrinsic volume in a sub-Riemannian manifold and how to define intrinsically a Laplacian in a sub-Riemannian manifold? The authors define macroscopic and microscopic Laplacians and solve the problem of equivalence of the two operators. The answers of the authors sound naturally due to the introduced notion of \textit{N-intrinsic volume}, which depends only on the set of parameters of the nilpotent approximation. In the case of equi-nilpotentizable sub-Riemannian manifold there exists a unique N-intrinsic macroscopic Laplacian that is built with Popp's volume. Moreover, the authors give the coordinate-free condition when macroscopic and microscopic operators are equal. Finally, a general theorem on the convergence of families of random walks to a diffusion is proved.