If 𝑈:[0,+∞[×𝑀 is a uniformly continuous viscosity solution of the evolution Hamilton-Jacobi equation ∂_𝑡𝑈+𝐻(𝑥,∂_𝑥 𝑈)=0, where 𝑀 is a not necessarily compact manifold, and 𝐻 is a Tonelli Hamiltonian, we prove the set Σ(𝑈), of points in ]0,+∞[×𝑀 where 𝑈 is not differentiable, is locally contractible. Moreover, we study the homotopy type of Σ(𝑈). We also give an application to the singularities of the distance function to a closed subset of a complete Riemannian manifold.

The Bieberbach estimate, a pivotal result in the classical theory of univalent functions, states that any injective holomorphic function f on the open unit disc D satisfies |f′′(0)| ≤ 4|f′(0)|. We generalize the Bieberbach estimate by proving a version of the inequality that applies to all injective smooth conformal immersions f : D → Rn, n ≥ 2. The new estimate involves two correction terms. The first one is geometric, coming from the second fundamental form of the image surface f(D). The second term is of a dynamical nature, and involves certain Riemannian quantities associated to conformal attractors. Our results are partly motivated by a conjecture in the theory of embedded minimal surfaces.

We present a brief but nearly self-contained proof of a formula for the Weil-Petersson Hessian of the geodesic length of a closed curve (either simple or not simple) on a hyperbolic surface. The formula is the sum of the integrals of two naturally defined positive functions over the geodesic, proving convexity of this functional over Teichmuller space (due to Wolpert (1987)). We then estimate this Hessian from below in terms of local quantities and distance along the geodesic. The formula extends to proper arcs on punctured hyperbolic surfaces, and the estimate to laminations. Wolpert’s result that the Thurston metric is a multiple of the Weil-Petersson metric directly follows on taking a limit of the formula over an appropriate sequence of curves. We give further applications to upper bounds of the Hessian, especially near pinching loci, recover through a geometric argumentWolpert’s result on the convexity of length to the half-power, and give a lower bound for growth of length in terms of twist.

In this paper, we observe that the brane functional studied in hep-th/9910245 can be used to generalize some of the works that Schoen and I [4] did many years ago. The key idea is that if a three dimensional manifold M has a boundary with strongly positive mean curvature, the effect of this mean curvature can influence the internal geometry of M. For example, if the scalar curvature of M is greater than certain constant related to this boundary effect, no incompressible surface of higher genus can exist.

We consider closed orientable hypersurfaces in a wide class of warped product manifolds which include space forms, deSitter-Schwarzschild and Reissner-Nordstr\"{o}m manifolds. By using a new integral formula or Brendle's Heintze-Karcher type inequality, we present some new characterizations of umbilic hypersurfaces. These results can be viewed as generalizations of the classical Jellet-Liebmann theorem and the Alexandrov theorem in Euclidean space. In particular, Corollary 1.8 implies that the embeddedness condition in Theorem 2 of [Brendle-Eichmair, JDG. 2013] is not necessary.