Collapsing irreducible 3-manifolds with nontrivial fundamental group (Q2655176)

The last step in Perelman's proof of Thurston's Geometrization Conjecture depends on a ``collapsing theorem'' which \textit{G. Perelman} stated without proof in his preprint [Ricci flow with surgery on three-manifolds. arXiv e-print service, Cornell University Library, Paper No. 0303109, 22 p., electronic only (2003; Zbl 1130.53002) \url{math.DG/0303109}]. Several proofs of this theorem have appeared in the literature, for example by \textit{T. Shioya} and \textit{T. Yamaguchi} [Math. Ann. 333, No. 1, 131--155 (2005; Zbl 1087.53033)], \textit{J. Morgan} and \textit{G. Tian} [``Completion of the proof of the geometrization conjecture'', arXiv:0809.4040], and \textit{J. Cao} and \textit{J. Ge} [``A simple proof of Perelman's collapsing theorem for 3-manifolds'', arXiv:0908.3229]. The paper under review presents a proof of a special case which is sufficient to prove the Geometrization Conjecture. In particular, the authors prove that if a closed, orientable irreducible non-simply connected 3-manifold \(M\) admits a sequence of Riemannian metrics which volume-collapses and whose sectional curvature is locally controlled, then \(M\) is a graph manifold. The proof combines arguments from Riemannian geometry, algebraic topology and 3-manifold theory. It uses Thurston's hyperbolization theorem for Haken manifolds, but avoids the stability and fibration theorems for Alexandrov spaces.