Compact anti-de Sitter 3-manifolds and folded hyperbolic structures on surfaces (Q2346531)

If \(\Sigma_g\) is a closed, connected, oriented surface of genus \(g\), with fundamental group \(\Gamma_g=\pi_1(\Sigma_g)\), then \(\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{fd}}_g\) and \(\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{nfd}}_g\) are the sets of conjugacy classes of Fuchsian and non-Fuchsian representations of \(\Gamma_g\) into \(\mathrm{PSL}(2,\mathbb{R})\), respectively. The space \(\mathrm{Hom}(\Gamma_g,\mathrm{PSL}(2,\mathbb{R}))\) of representations of \(\Gamma_g\) into \(\mathrm{PSL}(2,\mathbb{R})\) has \(4g-3\) connected components. \(\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{fd}}_g\) consists of the two connected components of extremal Euler class, and \(\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{nfd}}_g\) of all the other components of the quotient \(\mathrm{Hom}(\Gamma_g,\mathrm{PSL}(2,\mathbb{R}))/\mathrm{PSL}(2,\mathbb{R})\). Let \(\lambda:\mathrm{PSL}(2,\mathbb{R})\to\mathbb{R}^+\) be a function defined by \(g\mapsto\lambda(g)=\inf\limits_{p\in\mathbb{H}^2}d(p,g\cdot p)\geq 0\), where \(\lambda(g)\) is the translation length of \(g\) in the hyperbolic plane \(\mathbb{H}^2\). The function \(\lambda\) is invariant under conjugation. An element \([j]\in\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{fd}}_g\) strictly dominates an element \([\rho]\in\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{nfd}}_g\) if \(\sup\limits_{\gamma\in\Gamma_g\setminus\{1\}}\frac{\lambda(\rho(\gamma))}{\lambda(j(\gamma))}<1\). A folded hyperbolic surface is a pleated surface with all angles equal to \(0\) or \(\pi\), whose holonomy takes values in \(\mathrm{PSL}(2,\mathbb{R})\). A compact anti-de Sitter 3-manifold is a compact Lorentzian 3-manifold of constant negative curvature and is locally modeled on the 3-dimensional anti-de Sitter space \(\mathrm{AdS}^3=\mathrm{PO}(2, 2)/\mathrm{PO}(2,1)\), which is identified with \(\mathrm{PSL}(2,\mathbb{R})\) endowed with the natural Lorentzian structure induced by the Killing form of its Lie algebra. In this paper, the authors prove that any \([\rho]\in\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{nfd}}_g\) is strictly dominated by some \([j]\in\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{fd}}_g\), and any \([j]\in\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{fd}}_g\) strictly dominates some \([\rho]\in\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{nfd}}_g\), whose Euler class can be prescribed. Also, they show that an element of \(\mathrm{Rep}^{\mathrm{nfd}}_g\) is the holonomy of a folded hyperbolic structure on \(\Sigma_g\) if and only if its image is not virtually abelian, that is, it has no abelian subgroup of finite index. These results have applications to the theory of compact anti-de Sitter 3-manifolds.