Spectral theoretic characterization of the massless Dirac action (Q2827911)

The authors consider elliptic self-adjoint first-order differential operators \(L\) with smooth coefficients acting on function \(u:M\to \mathbb{C}^2\), where \(M\) is a connected compact three-dimensional manifold without boundary. Furthermore, the principal symbol of \(L\) is assumed to be trace-free and the subprincipal symbol is assumed to be zero. The authors study the eigenvalue equationNEWLINENEWLINENEWLINE\[NEWLINE Lv = \lambda w v NEWLINE\]NEWLINENEWLINENEWLINEwith a positive scalar weight function \(w\). Since the weighted spectrum of \(L\) is discrete, they define the eigenvalue counting functionNEWLINENEWLINENEWLINE\[NEWLINE N(\lambda):= \sum_{0<\lambda_k<\lambda} 1 \quad(\lambda\in\mathbb{R}), NEWLINE\]NEWLINENEWLINENEWLINEwhere \((lambda_k)\) is the sequence of eigenvalues of the eigenvalue equation, counted according to multiplicities. Under suitable assumptions, this counting function has the two-term asymptotic expansionNEWLINENEWLINENEWLINE\[NEWLINE N(\lambda) = a\lambda^3 + b\lambda^2 + o(\lambda^2) NEWLINE\]NEWLINENEWLINENEWLINEas \(\lambda\to \infty\). The aim of this paper, stated in the main result Theorem 1.1, is to obtain geometric interpretations for the coefficients \(a\) and \(b\). It turns out that they can be described by a Riemannian metric, the non-vanishing spinor field, and the topological charge. Furthermore, the coefficient \(b\) has the meaning of a massless Dirac action.