We study harmonic maps from an admissible flat simplicial complex to a non-positively curved Riemannian manifold. Our main regularity theorem is that these maps are C1, at the interfaces of the top-dimensional simplices in addition to satisfying a balancing condition. If we assume that the domain is a 2-complex,then these maps are C1. As an application, we show that the regularity, the balancing condition and a Bochner formula lead to rigidity and vanishing theorems for harmonic maps. Furthermore, we give an explicit relationship between our techniques and those obtained via combinatorial methods.

We prove a 2-categorical analogue of a classical result of Drinfeld: there is a one-to-one correspondence between connected, simply connected Poisson Lie 2-groups and Lie 2-bialgebras. In fact, we also prove that there is a one-to-one correspondence between connected, simply connected quasi-Poisson 2-groups and quasi-Lie 2-bialgebras. Our approach relies on a “universal lifting theorem” for Lie 2-groups: an isomorphism between the graded Lie algebras of multiplicative polyvector fields on the Lie 2-group on one hand and of polydifferentials on the corresponding Lie 2-algebra on the other hand.

Let $\sum$ be a minimal submanifold of $\mathbb{R}^{n+m}$ that can be represented as the graph of a smooth map $f : \mathbb{R}^n \to \mathbb{R}^m$. We apply a formula we derived in the study of mean curvature flow to obtain conditions under which $\sum$ must be an affine subspace. Our result covers all known ones in the general case. The conditions are stated in terms of the singular values of $df$.

We study the limit of quasilocal energy defined in [7] and [8] for a family of spacelike 2-surfaces approaching null infinity of an asymptotically flat spacetime. It is shown that Lorentzian symmetry is recovered and an energy-momentum 4-vector is obtained. In particular, the result is consistent with the Bondi–Sachs energy-momentum at a retarded time. The quasilocal mass in [7] and [8] is defined by minimizing quasilocal energy among admissible isometric embeddings and observers. The solvability of the Euler-Lagrange equation for this variational problem is also discussed in both the asymptotically flat and asymptotically null cases. Assuming analyticity, the equation can be solved and the solution is locally minimizing in all orders. In particular, this produces an optimal reference hypersurface in the Minkowski space for the spatial or null exterior region of an asymptotically flat spacetime.

In this paper, we consider the heat ‡flow for p-pseudoharmonic maps from a closed Sasakian manifold into a compact Riemannian manifold. We prove global existence and asymptotic convergence of the solution for the p-pseudoharmonic map heat ‡flow provided that the sectional curvature of the target manifold is nonpositive. Moreover, without the curvature assumption on the target manifold, we obtain global existence and asymptotic convergence of the p-pseudoharmonic map heat fl‡ow as well when its initial p-energy is sufficiently small.