(Non)collapsing

In this paper, we first prove Appleton's conjecuture on the uniqueness of noncollapsed steady solitons constructed in. We also classify non-Ricci-flat $\kappa$-noncollapsed cohomogeneity one steady gradient Ricci solitons in dimension four and five. After passing to a finite cover, in dimension four, they must be the Bryant soliton or Appleton's noncollapsed 4d steady soliton; in dimension five, they must be the Bryant soliton or solitons constructed by Ivey–Dancer–Wang.

We classify complete, non-compact, simply connected, irreducible four-dimensional steady gradient Ricci solitons that are globally conformally Kähler and have an isoparametric potential. The steady Ricci solitons are $U(2)$-invariant nuts on ${\mathbb{R}}^4$, including the Bryant and Cao solitons, and bolts on ${\mathbb{S}}^2\times {\mathbb{R}}^2$ and on $\mathcal{O}(-m)\to {\mathbb{CP}}^1$. For each $m\ge 3$ there is exactly one non-collapsed bolt. A key step, valid for Ricci solitons of every sign, is that away from the locally conformally flat case, the conformal factor is aligned with the potential function, which yields cohomogeneity-one symmetry.

We prove that a complete connected four-dimensional gradient steady Ricci soliton with positive curvature operator that is $\kappa$-noncollapsed at all scales admits an effective isometric $O(3)$ action preserving the potential function and having principal orbits diffeomorphic to $S^2$.

We give a finite negative-shift criterion for preserving a prescribed exterior noncollapsing bound under fully nonlinear curvature flows whose hypersurfaces need not be convex. The criterion uses the optimized two-point expression of Andrews and Langford. We verify it by a uniform global two-matrix estimate for the explicit speed $$F_{\epsilon }(A)=trA-\epsilon \frac{\text{norm}{A^{\circ }}^2}{trA}$$ on the open cone $$\Gamma =\{A\in \text{Sym}(n):trA>0,\text{norm}{A}^{\circ }<trA\}.$$ Here $A^{\circ }$ denotes the trace-free part of $A$. This cone contains the positive cone and also matrices with a negative eigenvalue, while the displayed speed is concave and non-convex. For an explicit range of parameters depending on the initial exterior bound, the cone and that bound are preserved throughout the smooth embedded existence interval. Together with the known interior estimate for concave speeds, this gives two-sided tangent-ball bounds for this nonlinear family, including closed nonconvex initial hypersurfaces.

In this paper, we study heat kernel estimates along the Kähler-Ricci flow with finite time noncollapsing singularities over a compact Kähler manifold. The starting point is the type-II scalar-curvature estimate, which gives the natural parabolic scale $r\lesssim T-t$ near the singular time. By combining the distance distortion and space-time cut-off estimates of Bamler–Zhang with entropy, mean-value inequality, and conjugate heat-kernel estimates, we obtain two-sided Gaussian bounds and gradient bounds that are uniform on this scale. Under the global type-I scalar-curvature estimate, the same estimates hold on every scale. We then use these estimates and the monotonicity of the $W_1$-distance between conjugate heat flows to construct a canonical singular-time pseudo-distance. The distances $d_t$ (induced by $\omega (t)$) converge uniformly to this pseudo-distance. Its metric quotient is the unique Gromov–Hausdorff limit. Finally, we apply Bamler's theory and the recent work of Hallgren–Zhang to obtain the following. Every fixed-base-point type-I blow-up admits a subsequential metric-flow limit whose time slices are singular shrinking Kähler–Ricci soliton spaces with normal complex-analytic and log-terminal structure, unique tangent cones, and a polarized Fano fibration. For moving base points, the limiting metric flow, equipped with its limiting conjugate heat flow, is a metric soliton precisely under an entropy-pinching condition.

Let compact $\mathrm{RCD}(\kappa ,N)$ spaces converge in the measured Gromov–Hausdorff sense, and suppose that they have $(\delta ,\rho )$-Reifenberg local covers for one fixed $\rho >0$, with $|\kappa |{\rho }^2\le 1$ and $\delta$ small. We prove that, along a subsequence, the spaces are singular fibrations over the limit: their canonical frame spaces converge to a topological manifold with a locally linear action of $O(n)$ whose quotient is the limit; for large indices the frame spaces fibre over this manifold, by maps that commute with $O(n)$, with fibres homeomorphic to nilmanifolds; and the induced maps to the limit are, near every point, quotients of products by the isotropy group, with fibres homeomorphic to infranilmanifolds. As applications, we extend a fibration theorem of Honda and Zhang to non-smooth RCD spaces whose local covers have injectivity radius bounded below, and we show that for aspherical spaces the isotropy groups are finite, the fibre groups inject into the fundamental groups, and the limit is the quotient of a contractible manifold by a proper cocompact action; under Rong's condition $A_s$ it is a closed aspherical manifold. Three appendices treat smooth manifolds with $\mathrm{Ric}\ge -(n-1)$ and small local rewinding Reifenberg error: a uniform short-time Ricci flow with $|\mathrm{Rm}|\le \alpha /t$, also for complete non-compact data, where it is unique among complete flows with curvature at most $A/t$; a second construction with affine nilmanifold bundles; and, conditional on Nifa's construction, examples showing that rewinding volume control alone does not give continuous Gromov–Hausdorff approximations with small error.

We establish a scale-invariant spatial non-collapse estimate for hypersurface-orthogonal timelike geodesic congruences. The result extends a previous Raychaudhuri-based construction in which a comparison estimate for the expansion was used to control the volume of domains transported along the congruence. The additional ingredient here is a quantitative estimate of the spatial distance distortion induced by the expansion and shear. Assuming that the initial spatial geometry is non-collapsed up to a scale $r_0$, and that the expansion, shear, and timelike Ricci curvature satisfy suitable uniform bounds, we obtain, before the first blow-up time of the Raychaudhuri comparison solution, \beginequation* \operatornameVol_h_τ\bigl(B_h_τ(p_τ,r)\bigr) \geq κ_L(τ)\, r^3, \endequation* where \beginequation* κ_L(τ) = κ_0 e^-3Kτ \exp\!\left(\int_0^τΘ(s)\,ds\right), \qquad K = \fracΘ_03 + Σ_0 . \endequation* Here $\Theta$ denotes the solution of the scalar Raychaudhuri comparison equation and $K$ controls the spatial metric distortion. For every finite time strictly before the comparison barrier, ${\kappa }_{\mathrm{L}}(\tau )$ is positive. When the comparison solution has a finite blow-up time, the explicit comparison coefficient approaches zero as that time is approached from below. The comparison barrier is a boundary of the estimate and is not, by itself, a statement that the physical congruence develops a focal point or spacetime singularity. The result is structurally analogous to scale-invariant non-collapse estimates in geometric flow, but is mathematically distinct from Perelman's $\kappa$-noncollapsing theorem for Ricci flow.

We study tangent flows of noncollapsed Ricci flow limit spaces in the sense of Fang-Li. We prove that the regular part of every negative time slice is geodesically convex: any minimizing geodesic that meets the regular part has its entire interior contained in it. We also identify each negative time slice with the metric completion of its regular Riemannian part, thereby identifying the negative-time tangent flow with its associated metric soliton.

We consider the problem of uniqueness of Ricci flows, starting from singular initial data. Even when the initial data is smooth and smoothly obtained, in the complete noncompact case uniqueness is not known in full generality. When starting from nonsmooth initial data, very little is known, even in the compact case. We obtain a uniqueness result for Ricci flows with scaling-invariant curvature bounds, a suitable noncollapsing assumption, and sectional curvature lower bounds, coming out of (possibly singular) Reifenberg spaces. As a consequence of our result, and existence results obtained by Simon–Topping and Lai, there is a canonical way to define a smooth structure on any Reifenberg uniformly volume-noncollapsed PIC2 limit space. Further, we obtain a diffeomorphic version of Perelman's stability theorem for these limit spaces.

We extend the classification of manifolds with positive isotropic curvature to all dimensions $n\ge 5$. This result also completes the classification of uniformly positive isotropic curvature on complete non-compact $\kappa$-noncollapsed ancient solutions and gradient shrinking Ricci solitons. The proof involves a construction of pinching cones in all dimensions, refining and extending to all dimensions the results of the first author. We have used MATHEMATICA to find viable parameters for the cone families. The final presentation is self-contained and can be verified manually. No stage of this work involved LLMs.

We establish a Type I curvature bound for finite-time volume-collapsing Kähler–Ricci flows on compact Kähler surfaces. No symmetry assumption is imposed, and the initial Kähler class need not be rational. The proof combines local symplectic topology with the classification of gradient Kähler–Ricci shrinking solitons. Bamler's compactness and structure theory provides the shrinking limits used in the argument.

The analytic minimal model program proposed in seeks to describe the birational transitions and fibre collapsing of the Kähler–Ricci flow through the geometry of its singularities. A fundamental conjecture of predicts Type I bounds for the scalar curvature and diameter of every fibre contratced by the limiting cohomological class at the finite singular time. This paper is a continuation of that establishes the Type I conjecture for collapsing solutions on Fano bundles with arbitrary smooth Fano fibres. If the fibre admits a smooth Kähler-Einstein metric, the Type I bound holds for the full curvature tensor.

We prove that any finite-time collapsing Kähler-Ricci flow on compact Kähler surfaces develops a Type I singularity. Together with the previous results, this implies that any finite time singularity of the Kähler-Ricci flow on compact Kähler surfaces is of Type I.

For any volume-collapsing finite-time singularity of a Kähler-Ricci flow on a compact Kähler surface, we show the flow satisfies a Type I curvature bound and classify the corresponding tangent flows. Combined with previous results, this shows that any finite-time singularity of a Kähler-Ricci flow on a compact Kähler surface is of Type I.

In this note, we study volume comparison for 3-manifolds with 2-Ricci curvature lower bound. We establish monotonicity and rigidity for geodesic sphere area and ball volume, and derive the pointed Gromov-Hausdorff precompactness under a uniform lower bound on the conjugate radius for 3-manifolds with 2-Ricci curvature lower bound. We also discuss the almost preservation of 2-Ricci curvature lower bound and the local non-collapsing propagation along Ricci flow. Finally, we point out a topological rigidity result on nonnegative scalar curvature.

We study collapsing finite-time singularities of the unnormalized Kähler–Ricci flow on Fano bundles arising in the analytic minimal model program. For a Fano bundle $X^n\to Y^m$, we prove a maximal splitting theorem by the Kähler-Ricci flow that every tangent space at a fixed limiting point splits globally as $({\text{C}}^m,g_{\mathrm{E}},J_0)\times (Z^{\prime },d^{\prime },J^{\prime })$. If the fibre has complex dimension one, we prove a global Type-I bound for the full curvature tensor and show that the ambient and intrinsic diameters of every fibre are uniformly comparable to $\sqrt{T-t}$. Furthermore, every tangent flow at any fixed limiting point is the round shrinking cylinder ${\text{C}}^m\times {\text{PP}}^1$.

We prove that any finite time collapsing Kähler Ricci flow on ruled surfaces develops a Type I singularity, such singularity is modeled on the standard product shrinker ${\mathbb{P}}^1\times \mathbb{C}$. As an application, we obtain the optimal collapse rate of fibers on ruled surfaces.

We construct and prove the transversal invariance of two families of pinching cones for the Hamilton ODE $\frac{\mathrm{d}}{\mathrm{d}t}R=Q(R)$ in dimensions $n=7,8$, thereby extending the pinching estimate established by Brendle for $n\ge 12$ and by Chen for $9\le n\le 11$. In dimension $n=8$, two steps in Chen's construction genuinely fail. The first, an estimate for the second cone family, is repaired by retaining a coupling discarded in the dimension-general argument. The second is the gluing of the two cone families, for which Chen's estimate fails at $n=8$ by a definite margin. We replace it with a new argument that reduces the gluing to a single linear inequality on the cone of weakly PIC curvature operators, and prove this inequality by an explicit finite combination of frame inequalities. In dimension $n=7$, the two separate cone-invariance results are proved, but the gluing step is not established here. Accordingly, the resulting full pinching estimate and classification statements are restricted to dimension $n=8$. The $n=8$ pinching estimate, together with dimension-free arguments of Brendle, yields the topological classification in dimension eight of compact manifolds with positive isotropic curvature that contain no nontrivial incompressible $(n-1)$-dimensional space forms, extending a theorem of Brendle from $n\ge 12$. Together with curvature-improvement and classification results of Cho–Li and Brendle–Naff, it also yields the classification of noncompact $\kappa$-noncollapsed ancient solutions to the Ricci flow with uniformly PIC, extending a theorem of Cho–Li from $n=4$ or $n\ge 12$.

We describe a Lean formalization of Hamilton's 1982 theorem on closed, connected three-manifolds with positive Ricci curvature. The development contains a short-time existence theorem for Ricci flow and substantial geometric-analysis infrastructure: Riemannian tensor calculus, the Levi–Civita connection, Ricci-flow evolution equations, scalar and tensor maximum principles, three-dimensional curvature algebra, preservation of Ricci pinching, and Hamilton's improved pinching estimate. The formalization follows an alternative blow-up route, rather than Hamilton's original normalized-flow proof. Its time-uniform short-time existence, maximal continuation, no-local-collapsing, and Cheeger–Gromov–Hamilton compactness pipelines have been formalized and are included in the artifact, while we give only a brief account of these companion developments and record the interfaces and consequences used by the Hamilton argument; a detailed exposition of their full constructions is deferred to the second author's forthcoming thesis. We interweave representative Lean declarations with their mathematical meaning and record the status and provenance of every major component. All source-level status claims are tied to the source release identified below.

We describe certain finite-time singularities of the Kähler-Ricci flow arising in the analytic minimal model program. Assuming that convergence to an asymptotically conical Kähler-Ricci shrinker is realized by holomorphic maps, we prove that, in a fixed holomorphic gauge, the nearby flow is modeled on the shrinker at the level of Kähler potentials. Consequently, every noncollapsed Kähler-Ricci flow through singularities in complex dimension two is modeled on a shrinker-cone-expander transition, confirming a strong form of Song's conjectural picture. We also show analogous results in higher dimensions under the Calabi ansatz, and improve known results in the compact shrinker case. These give the first compact Ricci flows through conical singularities whose small-scale behavior is fully described.