A Cheeger-like inequality for coexact 1-forms (Q2105217)

Let \(M\) be a closed connected Riemannian manifold of dimension \(d\), and let \(\Delta=-\operatorname{div}\circ\operatorname{grad}\) be its Laplacian on \(\mathcal{C} ^{\infty}(M)\). The celebrated Cheeger's inequality [\textit{J. Cheeger}, in: Probl. Analysis, Sympos. in Honor of Salomon Bochner, Princeton Univ. 1969, 195--199 (1970; Zbl 0212.44903)] relates the first nonzero eigenvalue \(\lambda_{1}(M)\) of the Laplacian with the \textit{Cheeger constant} \(h(M)\) defined as \[ h(M):=\inf_{S\hookrightarrow M,\left[ S\right] =0}\frac{\mu_{d-1}(S)}{\min(\mu(V_{1}),\mu(V_{2}))} \] where the infimum is taken over all separating embeddings of codimension \(1\) submanifold \(S\) into \(M\), where \(\mu_{d-1}\) (resp., \(\mu\)) stands for the \(d-1\)-dimensional Riemannian measure (resp., the Riemannian volume) of \(M\), and where \(V_{1}\) and \(V_{2}\) are the two resulting connected components of \(M\setminus S\). Cheeger's inequality reads \[ \lambda_{1}(M)\geq\frac{h(M)^{2}}{4} \] The principal objective in this paper is to establish a Cheeger-like inequality for the first positive eigenvalue of the Hodge-Laplace operator acting on \(1\)-forms. The question of a Cheeger-like inequality for differential forms was raised in Cheeger's original article [loc. cit.] and was formulated as Yau's Problem 79 in [\textit{S.-T. Yau} (ed.), Seminar on differential geometry. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ (1982; Zbl 0471.00020)]. On a closed oriented Riemannian manifold, the associated Hodge Laplacian \(\Delta_{p}=d\delta+\delta d\) acting on \(p\)-forms preserves the Hodge decomposition of the space of \(L^{2}\)-differential forms and its spectrum decompositions accordingly into three types of eigenvalues. \begin{itemize} \item[1.] the eigenvalue \(0\), corresponding to harmonic forms, whose eigenspace is identified with the \(p\)th de Rham cohomology group \(H_{\mathrm{DR}}^{p}(M,\mathbb{R})\); \item[2.] the exact spectrum, corresponding to exact \(p\)-eigenforms; \item[3.] the coexact spectrum, corresponding to coexact \(p\)-eigenforms.\(p\)-eigenforms. \end{itemize} In particular, as the spectrum of exact \(1\)-forms coincides with the nonzero spectrum of functions, the study of the spectrum of \(1\)-forms reduces to the case of coexact \(1\)-forms, for which we have \[ 0<\lambda_{1}^{1}\leq\lambda_{2}^{1}\leq \dots \] For a real homologically trivial curve \(\gamma\) of \(M\), we set \[ A(\gamma):=\inf_{S_{\gamma},\partial S_{\gamma} =r\cdot\gamma}\frac{(S_{\gamma})}{r} \] where \(r\) is any integer such that the curve \(\gamma\) traverses \(r\) times, \(r\cdot\gamma\) is trivial in \(H_{1}(M,\mathbb{Z})\), and the infimum ranges over all rectifiable currents whose boundaries are \(r\cdot\gamma\). We set \[ h^{1}:=\inf_{\gamma\hookrightarrow M}\frac{l(\gamma)}{A(\gamma)} \] where the infimum runs over all real homologically trivial smooth closed curves \(\gamma\), with \(l(\gamma)\) denoting the length of \(\gamma\). The main theorem reads as follows. Theorem. For any \(a<b\) and any \(D>0\), there is a constant \(C=C(a,b,D)\) such that for any closed orientable Riemannian manifold of diameter at most \(D\) and sectional curvature bounded below by \(a\) and above by \(b\) we have \[ \lambda_{1}^{1}\geq\min(1,C\cdot h^{1})^{2} . \]