An Invitation To Web Geometry

An Invitation to Web Geometry

This book takes an in-depth look at abelian relations of codimension one webs in the complex analytic setting. In its classical form, web geometry consists in the study of webs up to local diffeomorphisms. A significant part of the theory revolves around the concept of abelian relation, a particular kind of functional relation among the first integrals of the foliations of a web. Two main focuses of the book include how many abelian relations can a web carry and which webs are carrying the maximal possible number of abelian relations. The book offers complete proofs of both Chern’s bound and Trépreau’s algebraization theorem, including all the necessary prerequisites that go beyond elementary complex analysis or basic algebraic geometry. Most of the examples known up to date of non-algebraizable planar webs of maximal rank are discussed in detail. A historical account of the algebraization problem for maximal rank webs of codimension one is also presented.

An Invitation to Web Geometry

Plateau's Problem

There have been many wonderful developments in the theory of minimal surfaces and geometric measure theory in the past 25 to 30 years. Many of the researchers who have produced these excellent results were inspired by this little book - or by Fred Almgren himself. The book is indeed a delightful invitation to the world of variational geometry. A central topic is Plateau's Problem, which is concerned with surfaces that model the behavior of soap films.When trying to resolve the problem, however, one soon finds that smooth surfaces are insufficient: Varifolds are needed. With varifolds, one can obtain geometrically meaningful solutions without having to know in advance all their possible singularities. This new tool makes possible much exciting new analysis and many new results. Plateau's problem and varifolds live in the world of geometric measure theory, where differential geometry and measure theory combine to solve problems which have variational aspects. The author's hope in writing this book was to encourage young mathematicians to study this fascinating subject further. Judging from the success of his students, it achieves this exceedingly well.