Integrality of volumes of representations (Q2235213)

This article deals with the volume functional \(\mathrm{Vol}(\rho)\) over the representation variety, i.e. induced topological space structure, of homomorphisms \(\rho:\Gamma\rightarrow \mathrm{Isom}^+(\mathbb{H}^n)\). The volume was defined in previous works (from various sources, including the authors'), generalizing a classical notion given for compact \(M=\Gamma\backslash\mathbb{H}^n\). Here, this \(M\) is defined in the same way, just \(\Gamma\) is not necessarily cocompact; \(M\) is required to be a connected oriented complete hyperbolic manifold of finite volume. The article contains a thorough explanation of how \(\mathrm{Vol}(\rho)\) is defined, and various known properties are recalled, as well as new reassuring details are proved (such as the continuity of the volume functional). According to the authors, the main result is in Theorem 1.1 for \(n=2m\geq4\) and \(\Gamma<\mathrm{Isom}^+(\mathbb{H}^{2m})\) a torsion-free lattice: (i) if \(M\) has only toric cusps, then \[ \frac{2\mathrm{Vol}(\rho)}{\mathrm{Vol}(S^{2m})}\in\mathbb{Z}. \] (ii) in general, the same quantity on the left hand side belongs to \(\frac{1}{B_{2m-1}}\mathbb{Z}\), where \(B_{2m-1}\) is the Bieberbach number in dimension \(2m-1\). In a last section the authors give a result in dimension 3; this involves other deep results induced by the topology of the character variety of \(\Gamma<\mathrm{Isom}^+(\mathbb{H}^{3})\). It is then deduced that the image of \(\mathrm{Vol}\) contains at least an interval \([\mathrm{Vol}(M)-\epsilon,\mathrm{Vol}(M)]\) for some \(\epsilon> 0\). Improving on previous works, the authors state Proposition 1.2: Let \(M_\tau\) be the compact 3-manifold obtained by Dehn filling from the hyperbolic 3-manifold \(M\). If \(\rho_t:\pi_1(M)\rightarrow\mathrm{Isom}^+(\mathbb{H}^3)\) is the representation obtained from the composition of the quotient homomorphism \(\pi_1(M)\rightarrow\pi_1(M_\tau)\) with the holonomy representation of the hyperbolic structure on \(M_\tau\), then \(\mathrm{Vol}(\rho_\tau)=\mathrm{Vol}(M_\tau)\).