Measured foliations and the minimal norm property for quadratic differentials (Q795962)

Teichmüller's original proof of his uniqueness theorem uses, in an essential fashion, a key Lemma. This Lemma replaces areal averages by averages along trajectories of flows. The author shows that many of the most recent results in Teichmüller theory may be derived by clever application and extension of Teichmüller's trick. The major applications given here relate to, but are not identical with, the Marden-Strebel minimum norm property, the ''main inequality of Reich and Strebel and applications to the Hubbard-Masur theorem. The height (resp. width) of a curve \(\alpha\) on a Riemann surface S with respect to an integrable quadratic differential \(\phi\) is \[ h_{\phi}(\alpha)=\int_{\alpha}| Im \phi^{{1\over2}}dz| \quad(resp.\quad w_{\phi}(\alpha)=\int_{\alpha}| Re \phi^{{1\over2}}dz|). \] The following theorems are then proved. If every \(\phi\)-vertical non-critical segment can be continued indefinitely and if there exists an \(M>0\) so that \(h_{\phi}(\alpha)\leq h_{\psi}(\alpha)+M\) for all \(\alpha\) not a critical trajectory of \(\phi\) then \[ \| \phi \| \leq \int_{S}| \psi^{{1\over2}}| | \psi^{{1\over2}}| dxdy \] \(\psi\) is a (not necessarily holomorphic) integrable quadratic differential. Also \(\| \phi \| \leq \| \psi \|\) with equality holding if and only if \(\phi =\psi\). For the remaining results we omit the detailed (i.e. genus specific) hypotheses. If \(\beta\) is a \(\phi\)-vertical trajectory then \(h_{\phi}(\beta)\leq h_{\phi}(\gamma)\) for all \(\gamma\) homotopic with fixed endpoints to \(\beta\). If f is a quasiconformal homeomorphism homotopic to the identity, then there exists a constant \(M=M(\phi,f)\) so that all non-critical vertical trajectories \(\beta\) satisfy \(h_{\phi}(\beta)\leq h_{\phi}(f(\beta))+M.\) Further if \(\mu\) is the Beltrami coefficient of f then there is an integral bound depending on \(\phi\) and \(\mu\) for the norm of \(\phi\). A quick proof of the Hubbard-Masur theorem is then given. This theorem gives a uniqueness property of the horizontal trajectories minimizing the height of a curve. It is unique in its class of measured foliations. The interest in these results for topologists comes from the unique representation of a member of every equivalence class of measured foliations.