Interplay between Loewner and Dirichlet energies via conformal welding and flow-lines

Abstract: The Loewner energy of a Jordan curve is the Dirichlet energy of its Loewner driving term. It is finite if and only if the curve is a Weil-Petersson quasicircle. In this paper, we describe cutting and welding operations on finite Dirichlet energy functions defined in the plane, allowing expression of the Loewner energy in terms of Dirichlet energy dissipation. We show that the Loewner energy of a unit vector field flow-line is equal to the Dirichlet energy of the harmonically extended winding. We also give an identity involving a complex-valued function of finite Dirichlet energy that expresses the welding and flow-line identities simultaneously. As applications, we prove that arclength isometric welding of two domains is sub-additive in the energy, and that the energy of equipotentials in a simply connected domain is monotone. Our main identities can be viewed as action functional analogs of both the welding and flow-line couplings of Schramm-Loewner evolution curves with the Gaussian free field.

Review text

The authors of the paper describe cutting and welding operations on finite Dirichlet energy functions in the plane. The Loewner energy \(I^L(\eta)\) of a Jordan curve \(\eta\) in \(\hat{\mathbb C}=\mathbb C\cup\{\infty\}\) is the Dirichlet energy of a real-valued continuous function on \(\mathbb R\) called the Loewner driving term in the Loewner equation generating \(\eta\). If \(\eta\) passes through \(\infty\), then \[I^L(\eta)=\frac{1}{\pi}\int_{\mathbb H}|\nabla\log|f'||^2dz^2+\frac{1}{\pi}\int_{\mathbb H^*}|\nabla\log|g'||^2dz^2,\] where \(f\) and \(g\) map conformally the upper and lower half-planes \(\mathbb H\) and \(\mathbb H^*\) onto, respectively, \(H\) and \(H^*\), the two components of \(\mathbb C\setminus\eta\), while fixing \(\infty\). Here \(dz^2\) denotes the two-dimensional Lebesgue measure. Let \(\mathcal E(\Omega)\) be the space of real functions on a domain \(\Omega\subset\mathbb C\) with weak first derivatives in \(L^2(\Omega)\). Define the Dirichlet energy of \(\varphi\in\mathcal E(\Omega)\) by \[\mathcal D_{\Omega}(\varphi)=\frac{1}{\pi}\int_{\Omega}|\nabla\varphi|^2dz^2.\] The cutting operation is characterized by the following theorem. Theorem 1.1. Suppose \(\eta\) is a Jordan curve through \(\infty\), let \(f\) and \(g\) be conformal maps associated to \(\eta\) as above, and suppose \(\varphi\in\mathcal E(\mathbb C)\) is given. Then \(\mathcal D_{\mathbb C}(\varphi)+I^L(\eta)=\mathcal D_{\mathbb H}(u)+\mathcal D_{\mathbb H^*}(v),\) where \(u=\varphi\circ f+\log|f'|\) and \(v=\varphi\circ g+\log|g'|\). An increasing homeomorphism \(h:\mathbb R\to\mathbb R\) is a conformal welding homeomorphism if there is a Jordan curve \(\eta\) through \(\infty\) and conformal maps \(f,g\) of \(\mathbb H\) and \(\mathbb H^*\) onto the two components of \(\mathbb C\setminus\eta\), respectively, such that \(h=g^{-1}\circ f|_{\mathbb R}\). Suppose \(\mathbb H\) and \(\mathbb H^*\) are each equipped with a boundary measure with a distance between \(x<y\) by the measure of \([x,y]\). If a welding homeomorphism \(h\) fixing 0 is the isometry, then \(h\) is an isometric welding homeomorphism and the tuple \((\eta,f,g)\) is a solution to the isometric welding problem for the given measures. The isometric conformal welding is described in the next theorem. Theorem 1.2. Suppose \(u\in\mathcal E(\mathbb H)\) and \(v\in\mathcal E(\mathbb H^*)\) are given. The isometric welding problem for the measures \(e^udx\) and \(e^vdx\) has a solution \((\eta,f,g)\) and the welding curve \(\eta\) has finite Loewner energy. Moreover, there exists a unique \(\varphi\in\mathcal E(\mathbb C)\) such that the equalities of Theorem 1.1 are satisfied. Write \(\mathcal P(\tau)\) for the harmonic extension of \(\tau=\arg\eta'\) to \(\mathbb C\setminus\eta\) on both sides. Consider a vector field \(X(z)=e^{i\varphi(z)}\) on \(\mathbb C\). A flow-line of \(X\) through a point \(z_0\in\mathbb C\) is a solution to the differential equation \[\dot\eta(t)=X(\eta(t)),\;\;\;t\in(-\infty,\infty),\;\;\;\eta(0)=z_0.\] The flow line identity appears in the following theorem. Theorem 1.4. Let \(\varphi\in\mathcal E(\mathbb C)\cap C^0(\hat{\mathbb C})\). Any flow line \(\eta\) of the vector field \(e^{i\varphi}\) is a Jordan curve through \(\infty\) with finite Loewner energy and we have the formula \(\mathcal D_{\mathbb C}(\varphi)=I^L(\eta)+\mathcal D_{\mathbb C}(\varphi_0)\), where \(\varphi_0=\varphi-\mathcal P[\varphi|_{\eta}]\).

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