Chain level Floer theory and Hofer's geometry of the Hamiltonian diffeomorphism group. (Q1811381)

Let \((M,{\omega})\) be a symplectic manifold. This paper is concerned with the differential geometry of the Hamiltonian diffeomorphism group Ham\((M,{\omega})\) equipped with the Hofer metric. The Hamiltonian \(H\) is called quasi-autonomous if there exist two points \(x^-\), \(x^+\) in \(M\) such that \[ H(x^-,t) = \min H(x,t), H(x^+,t) = \max H(x,t) \] for all \(t\) in \([0,1]\). The author's main result is as follows: Assume that \(H\) is quasi-autonomous, and that \((M,{\omega})\) is weakly exact, i.e. that \({\omega}\) restricted to \(\pi_2(M) = 0\). If (1) \(H\) has no nonconstant contractible periodic orbits of period less than one, and (2) \(H\) has fixed minimum and maximum which are not overtwisted, then the associated Hamiltonian path is length minimising in its homotopy class with fixed ends for time in \([0,1]\). (If \(H\) satisfies the stronger condition of being autonomous, then the condition on \({\pi}_2(M)\) may be dropped.) In both cases this result extends work by several authors. The main tools are Floer homology defined using chains, a non-pushing down lemma, and a Floer theoretic version of the handle sliding lemma. Both lemmas are developed in detail (Sections 6 and 7). In a final section the author introduses a new spectral invariant of Viterbo type for a compact symplectic manifold. A more detailed discussion is promised in a further paper.