Morse theory for the travel time brachistochrones in stationary spacetimes (Q1599887)

The brachistochrones problem is to determine the shape of a frictionless slide between two points in space in such a way that a particle is driven by the gravitational field from the first point to the second point in the shortest time. Due to the lack of the global notion of time in General Relativity, relativistic brachistochrones problems are divided in arrival time brachistochrone, which measures the time by an observer placed at the final point, and the travel time brachistchrones, which measures the time by a watch that travels with the object. The authors have studied arrival time brachistochrones in [\textit{F. Giannoni} and \textit{P. Piccione}, J. Geom. Anal. 12, No. 3, 375-423 (2002; Zbl 1044.58017)]. In this paper, a variational theory of travel time brachistochrones is presented. As results, the differential equation for the travel time brachistchrones is given (3.15) and Morse Index Theorem and Morse relation for the travel time functional are obtained (Theorem 7.12 and Section 8). The outline of the paper is as follows: Let \(({\mathcal M},g)\) be a time oriented Lorentzian manifold, \(Y\) a fixed vector field, \(\gamma\) a maximal integral curve of \(Y\) and let \(k>0\) be a fixed constant. A travel time brachistochrone of energy \(k\) between \(p\) and \(\gamma\) is a curve which is a stationary point of the functional \(\sigma\to{\mathcal T}_\sigma\), defined in the set of piecewise smooth timelike curves \(\sigma:[0,1]\to {\mathcal M}\) satisfying \[ \sigma(0) =p,\;\sigma(1) \in\text{Im} (\gamma),\;\langle\dot \sigma,\dot \sigma\rangle= -{\mathcal T}^2_\sigma,\;\langle\nabla_{\dot\sigma}, y\rangle-0, \] \[ \biggl\langle \dot \sigma (o),Y\bigl(\sigma(0\bigr)\biggr\rangle=-k\sqrt{-\langle\dot\sigma, \dot \sigma \rangle}. \] It is noted if \(Y\) is a Killing vector field, then this second condition and \(\langle\nabla_{\dot \sigma}\dot \sigma,Y\rangle =0\) are equivalent to \(\langle\dot \sigma,Y \rangle= -k{\mathcal T}_\sigma\). The variational setup of travel time brachistochrones when \((M,g)\) is a stationary Lorentzian manifold and \(Y\) is a Killing vector field, is formulated in Sect. 2. For this purpose, denoting \(H^k\) the \(k\)-th Sobolev space, Sobolev manifolds \[ \Omega_{p, \gamma}^{(i)}= \Omega_{p, \gamma}^{(i)}(U_k) =\biggl\{w\in H^i\bigl([0,1], U_k \bigr): w(0)=p,\;w(1)\in \gamma(\mathbb{R}) \biggr\},\;i=1,2, \] \[ {\mathcal B}^{(i)}_{p, \gamma}(k)= \bigl\{\sigma \in\Omega^{(i)}_{p, \gamma}:\exists {\mathcal T}_\sigma\in \mathbb{R}^+ \text{ s.t. }\langle \dot\sigma,Y \rangle=-k {\mathcal T}_\sigma, \langle \dot \sigma,\dot \sigma\rangle= -{\mathcal T}^2_\sigma \biggr\}, \] where \(U_k=\{q \in {\mathcal M}: \langle Y(q),Y(q) \rangle+ k^2>0\}\), are introduced. The Sobolev 2-space is necessary to use the analytic machinery and it is shown this is not restrictive. But in this case, the arrival time functional does not satisfy the Palais-Smale condition (shown in the Appendix). This difficulty is overcome by the use of distribution described in Sect. 3 and change of local variables described in Sect. 4. In Sect. 3, the first variation of the travel time is calculated and the differential equation for the brachistochrone is obtained ((3.15) and Prop. 3.6). In Sect. 4, it is shown this solution is a local minimizer for the travel time (Prop. 4.4). The second variation of the travel time and the Riemannian Morse Index Theorem are explained in Sections 5 and 6. Some statements of these Sections are not given. The authors state that they are given in \textit{E. Giannoni}, \textit{P. Piccione} and \textit{D. V. Tausk} [Morse Theory for the Travel Time Brachistochrones in Stationary Spacetimes, LANL math-ph/9905007; see also Discrete Contin. Dyn. Syst. 8, No. 3, 697-724 (2002; Zbl 1003.58008)]. Then in Sections 7 and 8, the Index Theorem for brachistochrones (Th. 7.12) and Global Morse relations (Th. 8.1 and 8.4. They are equalities of Betti numbers of infinite dimensional spaces), are given.