Uniform resonance free regions for convex cocompact hyperbolic surfaces and expanders

Applications of graph theory (05C90) Selberg zeta functions and regularized determinants; applications to spectral theory, Dirichlet series, Eisenstein series, etc. (explicit formulas) (11M36) Functional analytic techniques in dynamical systems; zeta functions, (Ruelle-Frobenius) transfer operators, etc. (37C30) Thermodynamic formalism, variational principles, equilibrium states for dynamical systems (37D35) Spectral problems; spectral geometry; scattering theory on manifolds (58J50)

Abstract: The relation between expander graphs and spectral gap for eigenvalues of the Laplacian on Riemannian manifolds is well-known from the work of Brooks, Burger, Sunada, and Bourgain--Gamburd--Sarnak. In this paper we prove an analogous result for resonances of convex compact hyperbolic surfaces. Given such a surface

X

, let

d e l t a

be the dimension of its limit set, let

(X_{n})_{n i n m a t h b b N}

be a family of finite coverings of

X

, and let

(m a t h c a l G_{n})_{n i n m a t h b b N}

be the associated family of Schreier coset graphs with respect to the Schottky generating set for the fundamental group of

X

. We prove that if the surfaces

X_{n}

have a uniform resonance-free region in the vicinity of

d e l t a

, then the graphs

m a t h c a l G_{n}

form a family of expanders. In the other direction, we prove that if

(m a t h c a l G_{n})_{n i n m a t h b b N}

is a family of two-sided expanders, then

(X_{n})_{n i n m a t h b b N}

has a uniform spectral gap in the following sense: there exists some

e t a > 0

such that for all

n i n m a t h b b N

the cover

X_{n}

has no resonances in the half-plane

m a t h r m R e (s) g e q s l a n t d e l t a - e t a

, except for the "trivial" resonance at

s = d e l t a .

This result implies uniform spectral gap for the family of congruence covers

X (q)

of

X

where

q

runs over all positive integers. This was established by Oh--Winter for all square-free

q i n m a t h b b N

with no small prime divisors, and extended by Bourgain--Kontorovich--Magee to all

q i n m a t h b b N

with no small prime divisors. We construct further explicit families

(X_{n})_{n i n m a t h b b N}

with uniform spectral gap. We also prove the existence of a new "universal" resonance-free region for

X

, by which we mean a region in the complex plane that contains no resonances of any finite cover of

X

, refining a result of Magee--Naud. Our methods rely on the thermodynamic formalism for twisted Selberg zeta functions.

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