English

An invitation to Alexandrov geometry: CAT(0) spaces

Differential Geometry 2026-01-16 v4 Algebraic Topology Metric Geometry

Abstract

Our goal is to show the beauty and power of Alexandrov geometry by reaching interesting applications and theorems with a minimum of preparation. The topics include 1. Reshetnyak's gluing theorem, 2. Estimates on the number of collisions in billiards, 3. Reshetnyak's majorization theorem, 4. Hadamard--Cartan globalization theorem, 5. Polyhedral spaces, 6. Construction of exotic aspherical manifolds, 7. The geometry of two-convex sets in Euclidean space, 8. Barycenters and dimension theory.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1701.03483,
  title  = {An invitation to Alexandrov geometry: CAT(0) spaces},
  author = {Stephanie Alexander and Vitali Kapovitch and Anton Petrunin},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1701.03483},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

Draft of the 2nd edition