Smooth approximation of mappings with rank of the derivative at most 1

Abstract: It was conjectured that if

f i n C^{1} (m a t h b b R^{n}, m a t h b b R^{n})

satisfies

o p e r a t o r n a m e r a n k D f l e q m < n

everywhere in

m a t h b b R^{n}

, then

f

can be uniformly approximated by

C^{i} n f t y

-mappings

g

satisfying

o p e r a t o r n a m e r a n k D g l e q m

everywhere. While in general, there are counterexamples to this conjecture, we prove that the answer is in the positive when

m = 1

. More precisely, if

m = 1

, our result yields an almost-uniform approximation of locally Lipschitz mappings

f : O m e g a o m a t h b b R^{n}

, satisfying

o p e r a t o r n a m e r a n k D f l e q 1

a.e., by

C^{i} n f t y

-mappings

g

with

o p e r a t o r n a m e r a n k D g l e q 1

, provided

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

is simply connected. The construction of the approximation employs techniques of analysis on metric spaces, including the theory of metric trees (

m a t h b b R

-trees).

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