This is an announcement for the paper "Comparison of metric spectral gaps" by Assaf Naor.
Abstract: Let $A=(a_{ij})\in M_n(\R)$ be an $n$ by $n$ symmetric stochastic matrix. For $p\in [1,\infty)$ and a metric space $(X,d_X)$, let $\gamma(A,d_X^p)$ be the infimum over those $\gamma\in (0,\infty]$ for which every $x_1,\ldots,x_n\in X$ satisfy $$ \frac{1}{n^2} \sum_{i=1}^n\sum_{j=1}^n d_X(x_i,x_j)^p\le \frac{\gamma}{n}\sum_{i=1}^n\sum_{j=1}^n a_{ij} d_X(x_i,x_j)^p. $$ Thus $\gamma(A,d_X^p)$ measures the magnitude of the {\em nonlinear spectral gap} of the matrix $A$ with respect to the kernel $d_X^p:X\times X\to [0,\infty)$. We study pairs of metric spaces $(X,d_X)$ and $(Y,d_Y)$ for which there exists $\Psi:(0,\infty)\to (0,\infty)$ such that $\gamma(A,d_X^p)\le \Psi\left(\gamma(A,d_Y^p)\right)$ for every symmetric stochastic $A\in M_n(\R)$ with $\gamma(A,d_Y^p)<\infty$. When $\Psi$ is linear a complete geometric characterization is obtained. Our estimates on nonlinear spectral gaps yield new embeddability results as well as new nonembeddability results. For example, it is shown that if $n\in \N$ and $p\in (2,\infty)$ then for every $f_1,\ldots,f_n\in L_p$ there exist $x_1,\ldots,x_n\in L_2$ such that
\begin{equation}\label{eq:p factor} \forall, i,j\in {1,\ldots,n},\quad |x_i-x_j|_2\lesssim p|f_i-f_j|_p, \end{equation} and $$ \sum_{i=1}^n\sum_{j=1}^n |x_i-x_j|_2^2=\sum_{i=1}^n\sum_{j=1}^n |f_i-f_j|_p^2. $$ This statement is impossible for $p\in [1,2)$, and the asymptotic dependence on $p$ in~\eqref{eq:p factor} is sharp. We also obtain the best known lower bound on the $L_p$ distortion of Ramanujan graphs, improving over the work of Matou\v{s}ek. Links to Bourgain--Milman--Wolfson type and a conjectural nonlinear Maurey--Pisier theorem are studied.
Archive classification: math.MG math.FA
Submitted from: naor@cims.nyu.edu
The paper may be downloaded from the archive by web browser from URL
http://front.math.ucdavis.edu/1308.2851
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