Harmonic forms and cohomology of singular stratified spaces (Q996970)

The authors construct a potential theory for differential forms on compact stratified spaces. They consider compact spaces which can be triangulated, for example, any real analytic space, and they consider two extra structures: a stratification, using manifolds with corners, and compatible Riemannian metrics on the strata. They define a de Rham complex of smooth forms, such that its cohomology is the singular cohomology (on \(\mathbb C\)). They also define a quadratic functional which is a sum of Dirichlet integrals on each stratum. The quadratic functional imposes boundary conditions on each stratum and satisfies an ellipticity estimation, so that harmonic forms can be defined. The harmonic forms are sufficiently regular to be integrated on cycles and one can define a mapping from the space of harmonic forms of degree \(k\) to the singular cohomology of degree \(k\). The authors prove that this mapping is an isomorphism.