Overview of the geometries of shape spaces and diffeomorphism groups (Q2513411)

Let \(M\) be a compact smooth manifold of dimension \(d-1\) In this paper a shape is a submanifold of \(\mathbb{R}^d\) that is diffeomorphic to \(M\), and we denote by \(B_i(M,\mathbb{R}^d)\) and \(B_e(M,\mathbb{R}^d)\) the spaces of all immersed and embedded submanifolds. Let \(\mathrm{Diff}(M)\) be the diffeomorphism group of \(M\). The immersions \(q\) and \(q\circ \phi\), \(\phi\in\mathrm{Diff}(M)\), have the same image in \(\mathbb{R}^d\) and thus one can identify \(B_i(M,\mathbb{R}^d)\) with the quotient \(B_i(M,\mathbb{R}^d)=\mathrm{Imm}(M,\mathbb{R}^d)/\mathrm{Diff}(M)\). This article provides an overview of various notions of shape spaces, including the space of parametrized and unparametrized curves, the space of immersions, the diffeomorphism group and the space of Riemannian metrics. The following properties of Riemannian metrics on shape spaces are considered: geodesic distance; geodesic equation and existence of geodesics; geodesic and metric completeness; properties of the curvature. Open problems are considered also. Paper content: Introduction; Preliminaries; The spaces of interest (immersions and embeddings, shape space, the space of Riemannian metrics); The \(L^2\)-metric on plane curves (properties of the \(L^2\)-metric, gradient flows on curves); Almost local metrics on shape space (geodesic distance, conserved quantities, curvature); Sobolev type metrics on shape space (Sobolev metrics on plane curves, geodesic distance, the geodesic equation, well-posedness of the geodesic equation, conserved quantities, completeness); Diffeomorphism groups (right-invariant Riemannian metrics, geodesic equation; geodesic distance); Metrics on shape space Induced by \(\mathrm{Diff}(\mathbb{R}^d)\) (pattern theory, defining metrics on \(\mathrm{Diff}(\mathbb{R}^d)\), geodesic distance, the metric on \(\mathrm{Emb}(M,\mathbb{R}^d)\)); The space of landmarks (a metric on \(\mathcal{L}^n(\mathbb{R}^d)\) induced by \(\mathrm{Diff}(\mathbb{R}^d)\), the geodesic equation, completeness, curvature); Universal Teichmüller space as shape space; The space of Riemannian metrics (connections to Teichmüller theory and information geometry, geodesic distance, the geodesic equation, completeness). References: 140.