English

The Poincar\'e-Hopf Theorem for line fields revisited

Algebraic Topology 2017-04-26 v2 Differential Geometry

Abstract

A Poincar\'e-Hopf Theorem for line fields with point singularities on orientable surfaces can be found Hopf's 1956 Lecture Notes on Differential Geometry. In 1955 Markus presented such a theorem in all dimensions, but Markus' statement only holds in even dimensions 2k42k \geq 4. In 1984 J\"{a}nich presented a Poincar\'{e}-Hopf theorem for line fields with more complicated singularities and focussed on the complexities arising in the generalised setting. In this expository note we review the Poincar\'e-Hopf Theorem for line fields with point singularities, presenting a careful proof which is valid in all dimensions.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1612.04073,
  title  = {The Poincar\'e-Hopf Theorem for line fields revisited},
  author = {Diarmuid Crowley and Mark Grant},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1612.04073},
  year   = {2017}
}

Comments

13 pages, 3 figures. v2: Final version, to appear in Journal of Geometry and Physics

R2 v1 2026-06-22T17:21:57.465Z