Date of Award

8-17-2002

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

Critical points of the heat kernel on a compact semisimple Lie group are studied. The necessary background topics from abstract harmonic analysis, Lie group and Lie algebra theory, and Riemannian geometry are discussed. The fact that the heat kernel is a smooth class function on a compact semisimple Lie group is used to obtain partial results concerning location and degeneracy of its critical points. Original results on critical points of smooth class functions on a compact semisimple Lie group are presented in the last chapter.

Handle

http://hdl.handle.net/11122/6284

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