\(C^{1,\alpha }\)-subelliptic regularity on \(\text{SU}(3)\) and compact, semi-simple Lie groups (Q2285029)

The authors assume that the vector fields \(X_1,\dots, X_6\) form an orthonormal basis of \(H\), the orthogonal complement of a Cartan subalgebra (of dimension 2) in \(\mathrm{SU}(3)\). They prove prove that the weak solutions \(u\) to the degenerate subelliptic \(p\)-Laplacian equation \[ \Delta_{H,p}u(x)=\sum^6_{i=1}X^* i\big(|\nabla Hu|^{p-2}X_iu\big)= 0 \] have Hölder continuous horizontal derivatives \(\nabla Hu=(X_1u,\dots, X_6u)\) for \(p \geq 2\). Note that, in this case, the dimension of the space of non-horizontal vector fields, which turns out to be the dimension of the maximal torus, may be greater than 1; thus, it cannot support a contact structure since the dimension of the non-horizontal subspace is greater than or equal to two. For this reason, the authors are compelled to extend the Riemannian approximation method to SU(3) introduced by Capogna and Citti to get boundedness of the gradient, and then they extend the regularity proof to their case. Note also that, as in this case, they do not have a nilpotent structure, when they differentiate the equation, they need to account for all commutators by relying on the root structure of the Lie algebra. Lastly, the authors also prove that a similar result holds for all compact connected semisimple Lie groups.