Every covering of a compact Riemann surface of genus greater than one carries a nontrivial \(L^ 2\) harmonic differential (Q794806)

Motivated by a question raised by M. F. Atiyah in connection with \(L^ 2\) index theorem the author proves that every covering of a compact Riemann surface of genus greater than one admits a nonzero \(L^ 2\) harmonic differential. Some function theoretic consequences are discussed, among them a new proof of Myrberg's result to the effect that the limit set of a nonelementary Kleinian group has positive capacity. The main technical tool is an inequality, due to Ahlfors, relating the genus, area and length of the boundary for a relatively compact subset of the covering.