Geometric Property (T)

This paper discusses `geometric property (T)'. This is a property of metric spaces introduced in earlier work of the authors for its applications to K-theory. Geometric property (T) is a strong form of `expansion property': in particular for a sequence of finite graphs $(X_n)$, it is strictly stronger than $(X_n)$ being an expander in the sense that the Cheeger constants $h(X_n)$ are bounded below. We show here that geometric property (T) is a coarse invariant, i.e. depends only on the large-scale geometry of a metric space $X$. We also discuss the relationships between geometric property (T) and amenability, property (T), and various coarse geometric notions of a-T-menability. In particular, we show that property (T) for a residually finite group is characterised by geometric property (T) for its finite quotients.Comment: Version two corrects some typos and a mistake in the proof of Lemma 8.

The Baum-Connes conjecture for hyperbolic groups

We prove the Baum-Connes conjecture for hyperbolic groups and their subgroups

The coarse geometric Novikov conjecture and uniform convexity

The coarse geometric Novikov conjecture provides an algorithm to determine when the higher index of an elliptic operator on a noncompact space is nonzero. The purpose of this paper is to prove the coarse geometric Novikov conjecture for spaces which admit a (coarse) uniform embedding into a uniformly convex Banach space.Comment: 64 pages, to appear in Advances in Mathematic