We construct a conformally invariant random family of closed curves in the plane by welding of random homeomorphisms of the unit circle. The homeomorphism is constructed using the exponential of$βX$, where X is the restriction of the 2-dimensional free field on the circle and the parameter$β$is in the “high temperature” regime $$ \beta < \sqrt {2} $$ . The welding problem is solved by studying a non-uniformly elliptic Beltrami equation with a random complex dilatation. For the existence a method of Lehto is used. This requires sharp probabilistic estimates to control conformal moduli of annuli and they are proven by decomposing the free field as a sum of independent fixed scale fields and controlling the correlations of the complex dilatation restricted to dyadic cells of various scales. For the uniqueness we invoke a result by Jones and Smirnov on conformal removability of Hölder curves. Our curves are closely related to SLE($ϰ$) for$ϰ$<4.

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We prove the existence of a resonance-free region in scattering by a strictly convex obstacle $\mathcal{O}$ with the Robin boundary condition $\partial_{\nu}u+\gamma u|_{\partial\mathcal{O}}=0$ . More precisely, we show that the scattering resonances lie below a cubic curve ℑ$ζ$=−$S$|$ζ$|^{1/3}+$C$. The constant$S$is the same as in the case of the Neumann boundary condition$γ$=0. This generalizes earlier results on cubic pole-free regions obtained for the Dirichlet boundary condition.

We develop a theory to connect the following three areas: (a) the mean field equations on flat tori, (b) the classical Lame equations and (c) modular forms. A major theme in part I is a classification of developing maps f attached to solutions of the mean field equation according to the types of transformation laws (or monodromy) with respect to the period lattice satisfied by f.