1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910299975603321

Autore

Audin Michèle

Titolo

Morse Theory and Floer Homology / / by Michèle Audin, Mihai Damian

Pubbl/distr/stampa

London : , : Springer London : , : Imprint : Springer, , 2014

ISBN

1-4471-5496-7

Edizione

[1st ed. 2014.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (595 p.)

Collana

Universitext, , 2191-6675

Disciplina

514

Soggetti

Geometry

Geometry, Differential

Algebraic topology

Manifolds (Mathematics)

Differential Geometry

Algebraic Topology

Manifolds and Cell Complexes

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di contenuto

Introduction to Part I -- Morse Functions -- Pseudo-Gradients -- The Morse Complex -- Morse Homology, Applications -- Introduction to Part II -- What You Need To Know About Symplectic Geometry -- The Arnold Conjecture and the Floer Equation -- The Maslov Index -- Linearization and Transversality -- Spaces of Trajectories -- From Floer To Morse -- Floer Homology: Invariance -- Elliptic Regularity -- Technical Lemmas -- Exercises for the Second Part -- Appendices: What You Need to Know to Read This Book.

Sommario/riassunto

This book is an introduction to modern methods of symplectic topology. It is devoted to explaining the solution of an important problem originating from classical mechanics: the 'Arnold conjecture', which asserts that the number of 1-periodic trajectories of a non-degenerate Hamiltonian system is bounded below by the dimension of the homology of the underlying manifold. The first part is a thorough introduction to Morse theory, a fundamental tool of differential topology. It defines the Morse complex and the Morse homology, and develops some of their applications. Morse homology also serves a simple model for Floer homology, which is covered in the second part.



Floer homology is an infinite-dimensional analogue of Morse homology. Its involvement has been crucial in the recent achievements in symplectic geometry and in particular in the proof of the Arnold conjecture. The building blocks of Floer homology are more intricate and imply the use of more sophisticated analytical methods, all of which are explained in this second part. The three appendices present a few prerequisites in differential geometry, algebraic topology and analysis. The book originated in a graduate course given at Strasbourg University, and contains a large range of figures and exercises. Morse Theory and Floer Homology will be particularly helpful for graduate and postgraduate students.