Related papers: Curvature and Smooth Topology in Dimension Four

We show that there exist smooth, simply connected, four-dimensional spin manifolds which do not admit Einstein metrics, but nonetheless satisfy the strict Hitchin-Thorpe inequality. Our construction makes use of the Bauer/Furuta cohomotopy…

This article presents a new and more elementary proof of the main Seiberg-Witten-based obstruction to the existence of Einstein metrics on smooth compact 4-manifolds. It also introduces a new smooth manifold invariant which conveniently…

The Einstein-Maxwell equations on a smooth compact 4-manifold are reformulated as a purely Riemannian variational problem analogous to Calabi's variational problem for extremal Kahler metrics. Next, Seiberg-Witten theory is used to show…

This paper investigates the question of which smooth compact 4-manifolds admit Riemannian metrics that minimize the L2-norm of the curvature tensor. Metrics with this property are called OPTIMAL; Einstein metrics and scalar-flat…

We derive new, sharp lower bounds for certain curvature functionals on the space of Riemannian metrics of a smooth compact 4-manifold with a non-trivial Seiberg-Witten invariant. These allow one, for example, to exactly compute the infimum…

We show that solutions of the Seiberg-Witten equations lead to non-trivial lower bounds for the L2-norm of the Weyl curvature of a compact Riemannian 4-manifold. These estimates are then used to derive new obstructions to the existence of…

Using Seiberg-Witten theory, it is shown that any Kaehler metric of constant negative scalar curvature on a compact 4-manifold M minimizes the L^2-norm of scalar curvature among Riemannian metrics compatible with a fixed decomposition…

A simplified, user-friendly repackaging of the curvature estimates implied by the Seiberg-Witten equations is formulated in terms of the convex hull of the set of monopole classes. New results are also obtained concerning boundary cases of…

Any oriented $4$-dimensional Einstein metric with semi-definite sectional curvature satisfies the pointwise inequality \[ \frac{|s|}{\sqrt{6}}\geq|W^+|+|W^-|, \] where $s$, $W^+$ and $W^-$ are respectively the scalar curvature, the…

We prove that for every natural number k there are simply connected topological four-manifolds which have at leat k distinct smooth structures supporting Einstein metrics, and also have infinitely many distinct smooth structures not…

We consider an asymptotically flat Riemannian spin manifold of positive scalar curvature. An inequality is derived which bounds the Riemann tensor in terms of the total mass and quantifies in which sense curvature must become small when the…

All spherically symmetric Riemannian metrics of constant scalar curvature in any dimension can be written down in a simple form using areal coordinates. All spherical metrics are conformally flat, so we search for the conformally flat…

We extend the vanishing theorem for the Seiberg-Witten invariants of a manifold with positive scalar curvature to the case when the curvature is allowed to be negative on a set of small volume. (The precise curvature bounds are described in…

We show that each of the topological 4-manifolds $CP^2#k\bar{CP^2}, for $k = 6, 7$ admits a smooth structure which has an Einstein metric of scalar curvature $s > 0$, a smooth structure which has an Einstein metric with $s < 0$ and…

On a given closed connected manifold of dimension two, or greater, we consider the squared $L^2$-norm of the scalar curvature functional over the space of constant volume Riemannian metrics. We prove that its critical points have constant…

This paper is devoted to the first systematic investigation of manifolds that are Einstein for a connection with skew symmetric torsion. We derive the Einstein equation from a variational principle and prove that, for parallel torsion, any…

We construct an invariant of closed ${\rm spin}^c$ 4-manifolds using families of Seiberg-Witten equations. This invariant is formulated as a cohomology class on a certain abstract simplicial complex consisting of embedded surfaces of a…

Families of conformal field theories are naturally endowed with a Riemannian geometry which is locally encoded by correlation functions of exactly marginal operators. We show that the curvature of such conformal manifolds can be computed…

Let (M,J) be a minimal compact complex surface of Kaehler type. It is shown that the smooth 4-manifold M admits a Riemannian metric of positive scalar curvature iff (M,J) admits a KAEHLER metric of positive scalar curvature. This extends…

In this paper, we study closed four-dimensional manifolds. In particular, we show that under various new pinching curvature conditions (for example, the sectional curvature is no more than 5/6 of the smallest Ricci eigenvalue) then the…