Spectral deviations for the damped wave equation (Q707550)

Let \((M,g)\) be a smooth compact Riemannian manifold without boundary and \(a\) a \(C^{\infty}\) real valued function on \(M\). The ``damped wave equation'' \[ (\partial^2_t- \Delta +2a(x)\partial_t)v=0 \tag{1} \] for \(t\in\mathbb R\) and \(x\in M\) is studied. The term ``damped'' applies to the case when \(a\geq 0\) means that the energy is decreasing. The author is interested in the stationary solutions, that is, solutions of the form \(v(t,x)=e^{it\tau}u(x)\) for some \(\tau \in\mathbb R\). This means that \(u\) must satisfy \[ (-\Delta -\tau^2+2i a\tau)u=0. \tag{2} \] Equivalently, \(\tau\) is an eigenvalue of the operator \(\left(\begin{smallmatrix} 0&I\\ -\Delta& 2ia \end{smallmatrix}\right)\) acting on \(H^1(M)\times L^2(M)\). For \(a=0\), this operator is the (anti-selfadjoint) wave operator; but for \(a \neq 0\), the operator is not normal anymore. It is known that its spectrum is discrete and consists of a sequence \((\tau _n)\) with \(\text{Im}(\tau _n)\) bounded and \(|\text{Re}(\tau _n)| \to +\infty\). Here, \(\text{Im}(\tau _n) \in [2 \min (\inf a,0), 2\max(\sup a,0)]\) if \(\text{Re}(\tau _n)=0,\) and \(\text{Im}(\tau _n) \in [\inf a,\sup a]\) if \(\text{Re}(\tau _n)\neq 0\). Obviously, \(-\overline{\tau}_n\) is an eigenvalue if \(\tau _n\) is one, i.e., the spectrum is symmetric with respect to the imaginary axis. A Weyl-type fractal upper bound for the spectrum of the damped wave equation on a negatively curved compact manifold is proved. The number of eigenvalues in a given horizontal strip deviating from the indicated typical behaviour is counted; the exponent that appears naturally is the ``entropy'' that gives the deviation rate from the Birkhoff ergodic theorem for the geodesic flow. A Weyl-type lower bound is not obtained; but, in the particular case of arithmetic surfaces, and for a strong enough damping, using the trace formula, some result in this direction is established.