Related papers: On the role of abnormal minimizers in sub-Riemanni…

We use techniques from nonsmooth analysis and geometric measure theory to provide new examples of complete sub-Riemannian structures satisfying the Minimizing Sard conjecture. In particular, we show that complete sub-Riemannian structures…

We prove the $C^{1}$ regularity for a class of abnormal length-minimizers in rank $2$ sub-Riemannian structures. As a consequence of our result, all length-minimizers for rank $2$ sub-Riemannian structures of step up to $4$ are of class…

A longstanding open question in sub-Riemannian geometry is the following: are sub-Riemannian length minimizers smooth? We give a negative answer to this question, exhibiting an example of a $C^2$ but not $C^3$ length-minimizer of a…

We study the local geometry of the space of horizontal curves with endpoints freely varying in two given submanifolds $\mathcal P$ and $\mathcal Q$ of a manifold $\mathcal M$ endowed with a distribution $\mathcal D\subset T\M$. We give a…

We prove the smoothness of abnormal minimizers of subriemannian manifolds of step 3 with a nilpotent basis. We prove that rank 2 Carnot groups of step 4 admit no strictly abnormal minimizers. For any subriemannian manifolds of step less…

We study the regularity and branching of strictly abnormal minimizing geodesics in sub-Riemannian geometry. We construct examples of real-analytic sub-Riemannian manifolds admitting minimizing geodesics that lose regularity at an interior…

In this note, we show that sub-Riemannian manifolds can contain branching normal minimizing geodesics. This phenomenon occurs if and only if a normal geodesic has a discontinuity in its rank at a non-zero time, which in particular for a…

In the real-analytic setting, we show that all sub-Riemannian minimizers (parametrized by the arc-length) are real-analytic everywhere except an at most countable non-dense set. In particular, non-analyticity may occur only on a set of…

We prove that area-minimizing submanifolds are not generically smooth, settling a conjecture of White that asks the generic smoothness of area-minimizing submanifolds. We furthermore establish a lower bound on the Hausdorff dimension of the…

We study minimal surfaces in generic sub-Riemannian manifolds with sub-Riemannian structures of co-rank one. These surfaces can be defined as the critical points of the so-called {\it horizontal} area functional associated to the canonical…

We discuss some basic concepts of semi-Riemannian geometry in low-regularity situations. In particular, we compare the settings of (linear) distributional geometry in the sense of L. Schwartz and nonlinear distributional geometry in the…

We generalize the concept of sub-Riemannian geometry to infinite-dimensional manifolds modeled on convenient vector spaces. On a sub-Riemannian manifold $M$, the metric is defined only on a sub-bundle $\calH$ of the tangent bundle $TM$,…

We prove an integral formula for the spherical measure of hypersurfaces in equiregular sub-Riemannian manifolds. Among various technical tools, we establish a general criterion for the uniform convergence of parametrized sub-Riemannian…

It is well-known that normal extremals in sub-Riemannian geometry are curves which locally minimize the energy functional. Most proofs of this fact do not make, however, an explicit use of relations between local optimality and the geometry…

We study the geometry of the second-order expansion of the extended end-point map for the sub-Riemannian geodesic problem. Translating the geometric reality into equations we derive new second-order necessary optimality conditions in…

In this paper, we define and study strong right-invariant sub-Riemannian structures on the group of diffeomorphisms of a manifold with bounded geometry. We derive the Hamiltonian geodesic equations for such structures, and we provide…

Consider a smooth manifold $M$ equipped with a bracket generating distribution $D$. Two sub-Riemannian metrics on $(M,D)$ are said to be projectively (resp. affinely) equivalent if they have the same geodesics up to reparameterization…

We construct a Riemannian metric $g$ on $\mathbb{R}^4$ (arbitrarily close to the euclidean one) and a smooth simple closed curve $\Gamma\subset \mathbb R^4$ such that the unique area minimizing surface spanned by $\Gamma$ has infinite…

The geodesic orbit property is useful and interesting in itself, and it plays a key role in Riemannian geometry. It implies homogeneity and has important classes of Riemannian manifolds as special cases. Those classes include weakly…

Sub-Riemannian Geometry is proved to play an important role in many applications, e.g., Mathematical Physics and Control Theory. The simplest example of sub-Riemannian structure is provided by the 3-D Heisenberg group. Sub-Riemannian…