A spectral gap estimate and applications

Abstract: We consider the Schr"odinger operator

-frac{d^2}{d x^2} + V qquad mbox{on an interval}~~[a,b]~mbox{with Dirichlet boundary conditions},

where

V

is bounded from below and prove a lower bound on the first eigenvalue

l a m b d a_{1}

in terms of sublevel estimates: if

w_{V} (y) = | I_{y} |, e x t w h e r e I_{y} := l e f t x i n [a, b] : V (x) l e q y i g h t,

then

lambda_1 geq frac{1}{250} min_{y > min V}{left(frac{1}{w_V(y)^2} + y ight)}.

The result is sharp up to a universal constant if

l e f t x i n [a, b] : V (x) l e q y i g h t

is an interval for the value of

y

solving the minimization problem. An immediate application is as follows: let

O m e g a s u b s e t m a t h b b R^{2}

be a convex domain with inradius

h o

and diameter

D

and let

u : O m e g a i g h t a r r o w m a t h b b R

be the first eigenfunction of the Laplacian

- D e l t a

on

O m e g a

with Dirichlet boundary conditions on

p a r t i a l O m e g a

. We prove

| u |_{L^{infty}} lesssim frac{1}{ ho^{}} left( frac{ ho}{D} ight)^{1/6} |u|_{L^2},

which answers a question of van den Berg in the special case of two dimensions.

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