Removable sets for Newtonian Sobolev spaces and a characterization of \(p\)-path almost open sets (Q6172754)

Summary: We study removable sets for Newtonian Sobolev functions in metric measure spaces satisfying the usual (local) assumptions of a doubling measure and a Poincaré inequality. In particular, when restricted to Euclidean spaces, a closed set \(E \subset \mathbb{R}^n\) with zero Lebesgue measure is shown to be removable for \(W^{1 , p} ( \mathbb{R}^n \setminus E )\) if and only if \(\mathbb{R}^n \setminus E\) supports a \(p\)-Poincaré inequality as a metric space. When \(p > 1\), this recovers \textit{P. Koskela}'s result [Ark. Mat. 37, No. 2, 291--304 (1999; Zbl 1070.46502)], but for \(p = 1\), as well as for metric spaces, it seems to be new. We also obtain the corresponding characterization for the Dirichlet spaces \(L^{1 , p}\). To be able to include \(p = 1\), we first study extensions of Newtonian Sobolev functions in the case \(p = 1\) from a noncomplete space \(X\) to its completion \(\hat{X}\). In these results, \( p\)-path almost open sets play an important role, and we provide a characterization of them by means of \(p\)-path open, \( p\)-quasiopen and \(p\)-finely open sets. We also show that there are nonmeasurable \(p\)-path almost open subsets of \(\mathbb{R}^n\), \( n \geq 2\), provided that the continuum hypothesis is assumed to be true. Furthermore, we extend earlier results about measurability of functions with \(L^p\)-integrable upper gradients, about \(p\)-quasiopen, \( p\)-path open and \(p\)-finely open sets, and about Lebesgue points for \(N^{1 , 1}\)-functions, to spaces that only satisfy local assumptions.