Variational Methods in Geometry Seminar

I will present a series of results concerning the interplay between two different curvature conditions, in the special case when these are given by pointwise inequalities on the scalar curvature of a manifold, and the mean curvature of its boundary. Such results lie at two conceptual levels: on the one hand at the level of compatibility (i.e. is it possible to simultaneously satisfy the bounds, and what are the resulting topological constraints), on the other hand at the level of moduli space structure (i.e. what can one say about the homotopy type of the associated space of metrics, when not empty, quotiented by the diffeomorphism group of the background manifold). This lecture is based on joint work with Chao Li.