Quantum confinement on non-complete Riemannian manifolds (Q1624161)

Summary: We consider the quantum completeness problem, i.e., the problem of confining quantum particles, on a non-complete Riemannian manifold \(M\) equipped with a smooth measure \(\omega\), possibly degenerate or singular near the metric boundary of \(M\), and in presence of a real-valued potential \(V\in L^2_{\mathrm{loc}}(M)\). The main merit of this paper is the identification of an intrinsic quantity, the effective potential \(V_{\mathrm{eff}}\), which allows to formulate simple criteria for quantum confinement. Let \(\delta\) be the distance from the possibly non-compact metric boundary of \(M\). A simplified version of the main result guarantees quantum completeness if \(V\geq -c\delta^2\) far from the metric boundary and \[ V_{\mathrm{eff}}+V\geq \frac{3}{4\delta^2}-\frac{\kappa}{\delta},\quad \text{close to the metric boundary}. \] These criteria allow us to: (i) obtain quantum confinement results for measures with degeneracies or singularities near the metric boundary of \(M\); (ii) generalize the Kalf-Walter-Schmincke-Simon Theorem for strongly singular potentials to the Riemannian setting for any dimension of the singularity; (iii) give the first, to our knowledge, curvature-based criteria for self-adjointness of the Laplace-Beltrami operator; (iv) prove, under mild regularity assumptions, that the Laplace-Beltrami operator in almost-Riemannian geometry is essentially self-adjoint, partially settling a conjecture formulated in [\textit{U. Boscain} and \textit{C. Laurent}, Ann. Inst. Fourier 63, No. 5, 1739--1770 (2013; Zbl 1314.58017)].