selbergs trace formula on the -regular tree and applicationsselberg树的定期跟踪公式和应用程序.pdf

IJMMS 2003:8, 501–526 PII. S016117120311126X © Hindawi Publishing Corp. SELBERG’S TRACE FORMULA ON THE k-REGULAR TREE AND APPLICATIONS AUDREY TERRAS and DOROTHY WALLACE Received 7 November 2001 We survey graph theoretic analogues of the Selberg trace and pretrace formulas along with some applications. This paper includes a review of the basic geometry of a k-regular tree Ξ (symmetry group, geodesics, horocycles, and the analogue of the Laplace operator). A detailed discussion of the spherical functions is given. The spherical and horocycle transforms are considered (along with three basic ex- amples, which may be viewed as a short table of these transforms). Two versions of the pretrace formula for a finite connected k-regular graph X Γ \Ξ are given along with two applications. The first application is to obtain an asymptotic for- mula for the number of closed paths of length r in X (without backtracking but possibly with tails). The second application is to deduce the chaotic properties of the induced geodesic flow on X (which is analogous to a result of Wallace for a compact quotient of the Poincaré upper half plane). Finally, the Selberg trace for- mula is deduced and applied to the Ihara zeta function of X , leading to a graph theoretic analogue of the prime number theorem. 2000 Mathematics Subject Classification: 11F72, 05C99, 43A90. 1. Introduction. The Selberg trace formula has been of great interest to mathematicians for almost 50 years. It was introduced by Selberg [ 16], who also defined the Selberg zeta function by analogy with the Riemann zeta func- tion, to be a product over prime geodesics in a compact Riemann surface. But the analogue of the Riemann hypothesis is provable for the Selberg zeta function. The trace