Riemannian geometry and geometric analysis (Q5918219)

The book under review is the seventh edition of the author's reference work on Riemannian geometry and geometric analysis, which nicely synthesizes geometric and analytic methods in the study of differentiable manifolds equipped with Riemannian metrics. This edition was enriched with some new sections, several proofs have been simplified and many parts of the book were reworked and reorganized. The content is divided into 11 chapters. See [\textit{J. Jost}, Riemannian geometry and geometric analysis. 6th ed. Berlin: Springer (2011; Zbl 1227.53001)] for the 6th edition. In Chapter 1, the author introduces basic concepts in Riemannian geometry, like (differentiable) manifold, tangent space, submanifold, foliation, Riemannian metric and geodesic. Some elementary results concerning the heat flow and the existence of geodesics are proved. Chapter 2 deals with vector bundles and Lie groups. Lie algebra are also investigated, as well as symplectic and spin structures. Chapter 3 starts with the study of harmonic functions on Riemannian manifolds, the author discussing the energy functional, the Dirichlet integral and the Laplace-Beltrami operator. Next, it is shown that every \(L^2\) function on a compact Riemannian manifold can be expanded in terms of eigenfunctions of the Laplace-Beltrami operator. Then, the Laplace-Beltrami operator is extended from functions to differential forms of arbitrary degree. The de Rham cohomology groups are also investigated and the existence of harmonic forms representing cohomology classes is proved not only by a variational method, but also by the heat flow method. Chapter 4 addresses the study of the general theory of connections and curvature. The Yang-Mills functional is introduced and its basic properties are derived. After the presentation of the Bochner method, this chapter ends with the method of Li-Yau for obtaining eigenvalue bounds in terms of the diameter of a Riemannian manifold. Chapter 5 discusses in 4 sections the basic theory of submanifolds in Riemannian manifolds. A special attention is paid to a particular class of submanifolds, namely those that are critical points of the volume functional, i.e., minimal submanifolds. Chapter 6 is devoted to the study of geodesics and Jacobi fields. Several results that apply to compact or complete Riemannian manifolds of non-positive sectional curvature are discussed in detail. Chapter 7 presents in 6 sections the main properties of symmetric spaces and Kähler manifolds, while Chapter 8 focusses on Morse theory and Floer homology. In particular, the Morse inequalities, the Palais-Smale condition and the existence of closed geodesics are investigated. The general theory of harmonic maps is presented in Chapter 9, while Chapter 10 deals with two-dimensional harmonic mappings and holomorphic quadratic differentials. The existence of harmonic maps in two dimensions is discussed and some regularity results are also given. The last chapter addresses the study of variational problems from quantum field theory. In particular, the Ginzburg-Landau functional, the Seiberg-Witten functional and Dirac harmonic maps are discussed. The present volume ends with two appendices (on linear elliptic partial differential equations and topological results about fundamental groups and covering spaces) and a rich bibliography of 454 items, including some classical books and papers. All the material, written in a clear and precise style, is carefully developed, many examples supporting the understanding. In the reviewer's opinion, this is an excellent book, a very useful addition to any good library.