No label defined (Q4352399)

This contribution is about the characterisation of Lagrangian varieties arising in the study of variational problems with one-sided constraints. Different aspects of the problem and the related terminology are introduced by means of the example of the shortest path between two points of a Euclidean space \(M\) going around a smooth hypersurface \(\Gamma\). Various results are recalled concerning the characterisation of \(\ell_\Gamma\), the so-called variety of geodesics on \(\Gamma\) starting at points of tangency, and \(\ell_M\), the variety of outbound geodesics tangent to elements of \(\ell_\Gamma\). The author next considers the situation where \(M\) is the base space of a Hamiltonian system (on \(T^\ast M\)) and the obstacle is delimited by a smooth hypersurface in \(M\). He describes how Lagrangian varieties arise in the study of extremals of the corresponding action functional, whereby the terminology which is introduced is inspired by the example of the introduction. The main results (for the case when the Hamiltonian is quadratic and convex in the momenta) are theorems about formal diffeomorphisms characterising generically the variety \(\ell_M\), under different genericity conditions. The main tool which is used in proving these theorems is a theorem by \textit{V. I. Arnol'd} [Funct. Anal. Appl. 15, 235-246 (1982; Zbl 0487.58003)]. For the entire collection see [Zbl 0863.00038].