Discrete & graph Ricci

In the study of geometric structures on nilmanifolds, two-step nilpotent Lie algebras obtained by graphs play an important role. Recently, additional examples of nilpotent Lie algebras have been constructed from finite quivers without cycles. These latter examples can have arbitrarily high degrees of nilpotency, and admit Riemannian Ricci soliton metrics. In this paper, we study nilpotent Lie algebras obtained by finite quivers without cycles that are two-step nilpotent, and we prove that they can also be obtained by graphs. Using this relationship, we demonstrate that every two-step nilpotent Lie algebra obtained by a finite quiver without cycles admits a pseudo-Riemannian Ricci-flat metric. Additionally, we also classify these nilpotent Lie algebras that admit symplectic structures.

We study the combinatorial Calabi flow associated with vertex scalings on infinitely triangulated surfaces with piecewise Euclidean and piecewise hyperbolic metrics. Under the assumptions of uniformly bounded vertex degree and an $\epsilon$-uniformly nondegenerate initial metric, we establish short-time existence of smooth solutions and prove uniqueness among solutions that are continuous in the $L^{\infty }$ norm.

We give local combinatorial criteria for realizing prescribed ideal triangulations by nondegenerate hyperbolic truncated tetrahedra. A local bichromatic criterion allows valence-7 edges when tetrahedra meeting low-valence edges use at most two quotient-edge classes. Using the extended combinatorial Ricci flow, we obtain parameter-dependent criteria for triangulations of minimum valence 6. Symmetric and pair-min angle estimates yield explicit valence conditions, including mixed conditions on entire edge stars. The proofs use analytic angle inequalities and rigorous interval evaluations. Explicit face pairings realize the criteria and distinguish their scope, while cyclic constructions and finite covers give infinite families. Each criterion yields a unique zero-curvature hyper-ideal metric and exponential convergence from any positive initial length vector.

We study a natural way to deform area-preserving maps between compact Riemann surfaces. Specifically, we evolve the metrics on the two Riemann surfaces by the normalized Ricci flow and the graph of the area-preserving map by the mean curvature flow. We prove that the flow exists for all time, remains the graph of an area-preserving map, and converges smoothly and exponentially to a minimal Lagrangian graph with respect to the product of the limiting metrics. This generalizes earlier results of Wang and Smoczyk, in which the Riemann surfaces have constant scalar curvature.

We study the inverse-weight Lin–Lu–Yau Ricci flow on finite trees, and prove the convergence of the curvature on every edge via its diffusion equation. Moreover, the limiting curvature is the unique minimum-norm point of a polyhedron determined by the tree. We characterize possible limits of the normalized edge weights, give criteria for their convergence, and show that different positive initial metrics have equivalent omega-limit sets.

We present a numerical method that constructs geometrically defined coordinates on black-hole horizons, from which the multipole moments are computed without assuming axisymmetry. This method, which we denote the conformal-mapping method (CMM), provides a numerical realization of the conformal construction proposed by Ashtekar et al. in 2022, combining discrete Ricci flow, spectral embedding onto the unit sphere, and Möbius gauge fixing by the vanishing-area-dipole condition. We first test the CMM against analytic Kerr benchmarks, and then apply it to an equal-mass, non-spinning binary black-hole merger. We also compare it with an approximate-symmetry-based method. The CMM allows the multipole moments to be expressed in a fixed reference frame, whereas the symmetry-adapted frame can reorient abruptly when the preferred approximate axis changes. In a frame aligned with the orbital angular momentum, the amplitude of the quadrupole mode grows during inspiral and decays after merger, displaying a qualitative ringdown behavior. These results show that the CMM is a useful tool for studying horizon geometry in dynamical situations where no stable symmetry axis is available.

In this note, we prove that, on weighted graphs, the Lin–Lu–Yau curvature coincides with the $p$-Ollivier curvature up to scaling whenever the idleness parameter $p\ge 1/2$. Moreover, the threshold $1/2$ is sharp. This extends an earlier result of Bourne et al. (Ollivier–Ricci idleness functions of graphs, SIAM J. Discrete Math., 32 (2018), no. 2, 1408-1424), where combinatorial graphs were considered. This observation yields a simple proof for the global existence and uniqueness of solutions of the Lin–Lu–Yau curvature flow in Bai et al. (Ollivier Ricci-flow on weighted graphs, Amer. J. Math. 146 (2024), 1723-1747).

We study the combinatorial Yamabe flow on infinitely triangulated surfaces with piecewise hyperbolic metrics. Under the assumptions of uniformly bounded vertex degree and an $\epsilon$-uniformly nondegenerate initial metric, we establish the short-time existence and uniqueness of smooth solutions to the combinatorial Yamabe flow. To address the potential degeneration of triangles along the evolution, we introduce an extended flow with generalized curvature, and establish the global existence of solutions to the extended flow.Furthermore, under an integrability condition, we establish the uniqueness of solutions to this extended flow, which follows from the stability property of the solutions. These results provide a local well-posedness theory for the hyperbolic combinatorial Yamabe flow on infinitely triangulated surfaces.

In this paper, we study three-dimensional combinatorial Yamabe flows on locally finite infinite triangulations in Euclidean and hyperbolic background geometries. Under suitable non-degeneracy and bounded-degree assumptions, we establish the short-time existence and uniqueness of the original flows. We further introduce the extended flows by using the continuous extension of solid angles, and prove long-time existence for both extended flows under suitable initial assumptions.

In geometry, it is important to study whether a given Lie group admits a special left-invariant geometric structure. In our previous work, we constructed nilpotent Lie algebras from finite quivers without cycles by utilizing paths within these quivers. Also, we proved that the simply-connected Lie groups corresponding to these nilpotent Lie algebras always admit left-invariant Ricci solitons. In this paper, we extend our approach by constructing solvable Lie algebras from finite quivers without cycles, adding vertices as paths of length zero. We demonstrate that the simply-connected Lie groups corresponding to these solvable Lie algebras always admit left-invariant Ricci solitons. Moreover, we prove that when the quivers are oriented multi-trees, these Ricci soliton Lie groups are rigid, that is the direct product manifold of a flat manifold and an Einstein manifold.

In this paper, we first propose two different quantities on graphs, namely local entropy and cohesion, then design two corresponding flows for edge weights: the local entropy flow and the cohesion flow. We establish the global existence and uniqueness of solutions for both flows and investigate their asymptotic behaviors, including the case that the limit goes to positive infinity. Moreover, they can be applied to fundamental network analysis tasks, including community detection and node classification. Empirical evaluations demonstrate that our method achieves performance competitive with Ollivier Ricci flow and Lin-Lu-Yau Ricci flow on benchmark network analysis tasks. In experimental scenarios, we first apply the cohesion flow to evolve the edge weights of the graph, and then apply the local entropy flow to further update the resulting weighted graph. Both flows are computationally efficient, leading to a significant reduction in overall computational cost and improved scalability.

Nilpotent Lie groups with left-invariant metrics provide nontrivial examples of Ricci solitons. Some typical examples are given by the class of two-step nilpotent Lie algebras obtained from simple directed graphs and the class of nilpotent Lie algebras obtained from finite acyclic quivers. In this paper, we generalize the construction of nilpotent Lie algebras that are algebraic Ricci solitons obtained from finite acyclic quivers. We use some special ordered sets to construct nilpotent Lie algebras, which can also be obtained from some special quivers with relations. A transitively and antisymmetrically ordered set (or TAOS, for short) is a set together with a binary relation that is transitive and antisymmetric. Utilizing the concept of incidence algebras of TAOSs, we construct nilpotent Lie algebras. We modify the method introduced by Mizoguchi and Tamaru and use it to show that the nilpotent Lie algebras with arbitrarily high degrees of nilpotency obtained from some special finite transitively and antisymmetrically ordered sets, called array TAOSs, are algebraic Ricci solitons. We also give some generalizations of this result, which yield more nilpotent Lie algebras that are algebraic Ricci solitons. Moreover, the corresponding simply-connected nilpotent Lie groups admit left-invariant Ricci solitons.

In this paper, we consider the Ricci flow with prescribed curvature on infinite graphs, which reads as \beginequation* \fracddtω(t)=-(κ(t)-κ^*)ω(t), t>0, \endequation* where $\omega$ is the edge weight, $\kappa$ and ${\kappa }^{\ast }$ are Lin-Lu-Yau Ricci curvature and the prescribed curvature on the set of edges, respectively. First, we establish the existence and uniqueness of the solution to the Ricci flow. Furthermore, we prove the convergence of the Ricci flow for graphs with girth at least 6 under two different conditions. Our convergence result aligns with the conclusion of Rodin and Sullivan (J Differ Geom, 26(2) 1987) that a circle packing in the plane with the hexagonal pattern is the regular hexagonal packing.

In this paper, we investigate the prescribed curvature problem associated with a special Lin-Lu-Yau curvature on finite graphs of girth at least 6. We define the corresponding Calabi flow for this curvature type, and establish an equivalent characterization of the problem, namely, the solution to the Calabi flow exists globally in time and converges if and only if there exists a weight function that realizes the prescribed curvature. In particular, for constant curvature weights, we prove that the solution to the Calabi flow exists globally in time and converges under certain topological conditions.

In this paper, we consider the Ricci flow with prescribed curvature on the finite graph $G=(V,E)$. For any $e$ in $E$, $$\frac{d\omega (t,e)}{dt}=-(\kappa (t,e)-{\kappa }^{\ast }(e))\omega (t,e),t>0,$$ where $\omega$ is the weight function, $\kappa$ is Lin-Lu-Yau Ricci curvature, and ${\kappa }^{\ast }$ is the prescribed curvature. By imposing invariance of the graph distance with respect to time $t$, the Ricci flow introduced above characterizes the weight evolution governed by the Lin-Lu-Yau curvature. We first establish the existence and uniqueness of the solution to this equation on general graphs. Furthermore, for graphs with girth of at least 6, we prove that the Ricci flow converges exponentially to weights of ${\kappa }^{\ast }$ if and only if ${\kappa }^{\ast }$ is attainable (namely, there exist weights realizing ${\kappa }^{\ast }$). In particular, we prove that the weights for constant curvature exist if and only if $$\underset{\varnothing \ne \Omega ⊊V}{\max }\frac{|E(\Omega )|}{|\Omega |}<\frac{|E|}{|V|},$$ where $E(\Omega )$ denotes the set of edges within the induced subgraph of $\Omega$, and $|A|$ is the cardinality of the set $A$. Viewing edge weights as metrics on surface tilings with girth of at least 5 or the duals of triangulations with vertex degrees exceeding 5, we demonstrate that our constant Lin-Lu-Yau curvature flow serves as an analog to the 2D combinatorial Ricci flow for piecewise constant curvature metrics, thereby providing an affirmative answer to Question 2 posed by Chow and Luo (J Differ Geom, 63(1) 2002).

Let $S$ be an oriented closed surface with a cellular decomposition $\mathcal{D}$ and a weight $\Phi \in (0,\pi )$. It is crucial to determine when $S$ supports an ideal $\mathcal{D}$-type circle pattern $\mathcal{P}$ with the exterior intersection angles given by $\Phi$. Rivin, Bobenko-Springborn and Ge-Hua-Zhou provided perfect solutions and gave wonderful criteria for the existence and uniqueness of ideal circle patterns. However, all criteria established by Rivin, Bobenko-Springborn and Ge-Hua-Zhou are extremely difficult to verify for the given cellular decomposition $\mathcal{D}$ and the weight $\Phi$. In this paper, we introduce the character $\mathcal{L}(\mathcal{D},\Phi )$ depends only on the data of the weighted cellular decomposition $(\mathcal{D},\Phi )$ on $S$, and give some quite simple criteria for the existence of ideal circle patterns realizing $(\mathcal{D},\Phi )$. It seems that our character-type criteria are the first conditions totally different from criteria of Rivin, Bobenko-Springborn and Ge-Hua-Zhou, and provide more easily verifiable criteria. Our new character-type theorems may be of some independent interest. As an application, we give a new descriptions of the curvature image set $\mathbf{K}({\mathbb{R}}_{>0}^N)$. To approach our results, we shall use the combinatorial Ricci flows with ideal circle patterns introduced by Ge-Hua-Zhou as a fundamental tool. The main difficulty in the proof of our results is to establish the compactness of the solution to the flows. To circumvent the difficulty, we borrow the techniques developed by Ge and his collaborators.

In this paper, we study a combinatorial Ricci flow on closed pseudo $3$-manifolds $(M,\mathcal{T})$. We prove that if every edge in the triangulation $\mathcal{T}$ has valence at least $9$, then the combinatorial Ricci flow converges exponentially fast to the unique zero-curvature hyper-ideal metric. As a consequence, for any compact $3$-manifold $N$ with boundary admitting an ideal triangulation ${\mathcal{T}}_N$ whose edges all have valence at least $9$, there exists a unique complete hyperbolic metric with totally geodesic boundary on $N$ such that ${\mathcal{T}}_N$ is isotopic to a geometric decomposition of $N$. This provides a partial solution to the conjecture of Costantino, Frigerio, Martelli and Petronio, and hence an affirmative answer to Thurston's geometric ideal triangulation conjecture for such manifolds. Moreover, we obtain explicit upper and lower bounds for the resulting hyperbolic metric.

In this paper, we propose a type of Ricci flow on graphs where the probability distribution for the Lin-Lu-Yau curvature remains constant over time, and also study the related Forman curvature flow. These two curvature flows coincide on trees. We first prove the existence and uniqueness of solutions for both curvature flows in general graphs. Then, we obtain that the normalized curvature flow on trees converges to a constant curvature metric, and under the uniform measure, a complete classification of trees can be obtained based on the convergence results.

Deep neural networks learn feature representations via complex geometric transformations of the input data manifold. Despite the models' empirical success across domains, our understanding of neural feature representations is still incomplete. In this work we investigate neural feature geometry through the lens of discrete geometry. Since the input data manifold is typically unobserved, we approximate it using geometric graphs that encode local similarity structure. We provide theoretical results on the evolution of these graphs during training, showing that nonlinear activations play a crucial role in shaping feature geometry in feedforward neural networks. Moreover, we discover that the geometric transformations resemble a discrete Ricci flow on these graphs, suggesting that neural feature geometry evolves analogous to Ricci flow. This connection is supported by experiments on over 20,000 feedforward neural networks trained on binary classification tasks across both synthetic and real-world datasets. We observe that the emergence of class separability corresponds to the emergence of community structure in the associated graph representations, which is known to relate to discrete Ricci flow dynamics. Building on these insights, we introduce a novel framework for locally evaluating geometric transformations through comparison with discrete Ricci flow dynamics. Our results suggest practical design principles, including a geometry-informed early-stopping heuristic and a criterion for selecting network depth.

In this paper, we study the evolution of metrics on finite trees under continuous-time Ricci flows based on the Lin-Lu-Yau version of Ollivier Ricci curvature. We analyze long-time dynamics of edge weights and curvatures, providing precise characterizations of their limiting behaviors. We prove that the Ricci flow converges to metric with zero curvature on edges whose normalized weights converge to positive values only if the tree is a caterpillar tree.