The Gromov norm of the product of two surfaces (Q1767609)

In the paper under review, the authors give an estimate on the value of the Gromov norm of the product of two surfaces. Let \(M^n\) be an oriented closed manifold of dimension \(n\). For each nonnegative integer \(k\), let \(S_k(M)\) be the real vector space with basis the singular \(k\)-simplexes on \(M\). For a \(k\)-chain \(c = \sum_\sigma r(\sigma) \sigma,\,\,\, \sigma \in S_k(M)\), the norm of \(c\) is defined by \(\| c\| = \sum_{\sigma} | r(\sigma)| \). If \(\alpha\) is a homology class in \(H_k(M)\), its simplicial norm is by definition the infimum of \(\| c\|\) over all \(k\)-chains on \(M\). The Gromov norm of \(M\) is the simplicial norm of the fundamental class \([M] \in H_n(M)\) and denoted by \(\| M \|\). On the other hand, let \(P\) be a polytope and for each \(k \in {\mathbb N}\), let \(S_k(P)\) be the real vector space with basis equal to the set of all affine maps \(\sigma: \Delta^k \to P\) for the \(k\)-simplex \(\Delta^k\). Let \(S(P)\) denote the resulting singular chain complex and define \[ S(P, \partial P) = S(P)/S(\partial P) \] to be the relative chain complex of \((P, \partial P)\). Let \(H_*(P, \partial P)\) be the relative homology space. The polytopal Gromov norm of \(P\) is the pseudonorm of the fundamental class \([P, \partial P] \in H_n(P, \partial P)\) and is denoted by \(\| P \|\). For positive integers \(n, m\), let \(P(n, m)\) be the product of an \(n\)-gon with an \(m\)-gon. One of main result in this paper is that the Gromov norm of the product of two surfaces is given by the limit of the polytopal Gromov norm of \((P, \partial P)\). Namely, let \(\Sigma_g, \Sigma_h\) be two surfaces of genus \(g\) and \(h\), respectively. Then \[ \frac{\| \Sigma_g \times \Sigma_h \|}{(g-1)(h-1)} = 16 \lim_{n, m \to \infty} \frac{\| P(n, m) \|}{nm} = 16 \inf_{n,m} \frac{\| P(n, m) \|}{nm}. \] On the other hand, the authors prove that the polytopal Gromov norm of \(P(n, m)\) is bounded by above by the minimal number of simplexes in a triangulation of \(P(n, m)\) and they also show that the polytopal Gromov norm of \(P(n,m)\) has a lower bound. In conclusion, combining these results the authors obtain \[ 32 \leq \frac{\| \Sigma_g \times \Sigma_h \|}{(g-1)(h-1)}\leq 52. \] This result improves the known results about the Gromov norm of the product of two surfaces.