Controlled geometry via smoothing (Q1125554)

The authors assume that they have found the minimal degree of local geometric control on the metric tensor \(g\) of a Riemannian manifold \(M\) from which interesting global geometric and topological consequences for \(M\) can be drawn. This control is stated in terms of a family of norms on the metric and are defined either in terms of the \(C^{k,\alpha}\)-norms or the \(L^{k,p}\)-norms for functions. For some scale \(r>0\), these norms consider the embeddings of the standard Euclidean ball \(B(0,r)\) of radius \(r\) in \(M\), roughly as coordinate charts about each point of \(M\), and how smooth and well-behaved the associated locally defined pullback metrics on \(B(0,r)\) are. In the presence of uniform weak norm, the authors show that the Riemannian metric can be smoothed to have arbitrarily high regularity. Their smoothings generalize all previous smoothing results. As a consequence they also obtain a generalization of Gromov's almost flat manifold theorem and obtain a uniform Betti number estimate. The method of proof involves embedding the manifold into the Hilbert space of \(L^2\) functions on \(M\). This embedding uses solutions of a canonical geometric partial differential equation. The smoothed metrics arise as pullbacks of the \(L^2\) metric of the Hilbert space.