Abstract

Certain Sobolev spaces of S¹-valued functions can be written as a disjoint union of homotopy classes. The problem of finding the distance between different homotopy classes in such spaces is considered. In particular several types of one-dimensional and two-dimensional domains are studied. Lower bounds are derived for these distances. Furthermore, in many cases it is shown that the lower bounds are sharp but are not achieved.

This is a joint work with Jacob Rubinstein

TUESDAY, December 6, 2005
Time: 1:30 P.M.
Location: PPB 300