The hyperbolic manifolds are local minima of the topological entropy (Q1340626)

Let \(X\) be a compact connected hyperbolic manifold of dimension \(n\) with the metric \(g\), and \(\widetilde X\) be the universal covering space of \(X\). Define the volume entropy of \(g\) by: \[ h(g) = \lim_{R \to + \infty} {1 \over R} \text{Log vol} (B(x,R)), \] where vol(\(B(x,R)\)) is the volume of the ball in \(\widetilde X\) with the centre \(x\) and radius \(R\). It is known that if the curvature of \(g\) is nonpositive, then \(h(g)\) is equal to the topological entropy of the geodesic flow of \(g\). The authors prove the following theorem: Let \((X, g_ 0)\) be a real hyperbolic manifold of dimension \(n\). For all \(s > {n \over 2} + 2\), there exists a cylindrical neighbourhood \({\mathcal U}\) of \(g_ 0\) (in the topology \(H^ s)\) in the space of all metrics on \(X\), such that if \(g \in {\mathcal U}\) and \(\text{vol} (g) = \text{vol} (g_ 0)\), then \(h(g) \geq h(g_ 0)\). Moreover, (i) if \(n = 2\), \({\mathcal U}\) is all the space of metrics, and the equality holds if and only if \(g\) is hypberbolic, (ii) if \(n\geq 3\), the equality holds if and only if \(g\) and \(g_ 0\) are isometric. The theorem is followed by some corollaries concerning metrics in \({\mathcal U}\) which satisfy some additional conditions.