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We study the gain in regularity of the distance to the boundary of a domain in $\R^m$. In particular, we show that if the signed distance function happens to be merely differentiable in a neighborhood of a boundary point, it and the boundary have to be $\mathcal C^{1,1}$ regular. Conversely, we study the regularity of the distance function under regularity hypotheses of the boundary. Along the way, we point out that any solution to the eikonal equation, differentiable everywhere in a domain of the Euclidean space, admits a gradient which is locally Lipschitz., Comment: 6 pages

We show that a domain that satisfies the visibility property with $\mathcal C^2$-smooth boundary is pseudoconvex., Comment: 6 pages; some typos and inaccuracies have been fixed. To appear in Bull. Sci. Math

Lipschitz constants for the width and diameter functions of a convex body in $\mathbb R^n$ are found in terms of its diameter and thickness (maximum and minimum of both functions). Also, a dual approach to thickness is proposed.

We prove that in a strongly pseudoconvex domain with smooth boundary, then the length of a geodesic for the Kobayashi-Royden infinitesimal metric between two points is bounded by a constant multiple of the Euclidean distance between the points.

In this note, we introduce the notion of visible boundary points with respect to Kobayashi distance for domains in complex euclidean space. Following the work of Sarkar, we obtain additive and multiplicative localization results about Kobayashi distance near visible boundary points. Then using the additive localization result, we show that visibility property with respect to Kobayashi distance is a local property of the boundary points and it does not depend on the domain.

We introduce the notion of locally visible and locally Gromov hyperbolic domains in $\mathbb C^d$. We prove that a bounded domain in $\mathbb C^d$ is locally visible and locally Gromov hyperbolic if and only if it is (globally) visible and Gromov hyperbolic with respect to the Kobayashi distance. This allows to detect, from local information near the boundary, those domains which are Gromov hyperbolic and for which biholomorphisms extend continuously up to the boundary., Comment: 25 pages

We obtain explicit bounds on the difference and ratio between "local" and "global" Kobayashi distances in a domain of $\mathbb C^n$ as the points go toward a boundary point with appropriate geometric properties. We use this for the global comparison of various invariant distances. We provide some sharp estimates in dimension $1$., Comment: v2: Results about ratio of invariant distances and some references have been added, some proofs have been streamlined. v3: Major revision. To appear in J. Geom. Anal

Let $D\subset \mathbb C^n$ be a bounded domain. A pair of distinct boundary points $\{p,q\}$ of $D$ has the visibility property provided there exist a compact subset $K_{p,q}\subset D$ and open neighborhoods $U_p$ of $p$ and $U_q$ of $q$, such that the real geodesics for the Kobayashi metric of $D$ which join points in $U_p$ and $U_q$ intersect $K_{p,q}$. Every Gromov hyperbolic convex domain enjoys the visibility property for any couple of boundary points. The Goldilocks domains introduced by Bharali and Zimmer and the log-type domains of Liu and Wang also enjoy the visibility property. In this paper we relate the growth of the Kobayashi distance near the boundary with visibility and provide new families of convex domains where that property holds. We use the same methods to provide refinements of localization results for the Kobayashi distance, and give a localized sufficient condition for visibility. We also exploit visibility to study the boundary behavior of biholomorphic maps., Comment: Correction to the proof of Lemma 5.3

It is shown that even a weak multidimensional Suita conjecture fails for any bounded non-pseudoconvex domain with $\mathcal C^1$ boundary: the product of the Bergman kernel by the volume of the indicatrix of the Azukawa metric is not bounded below. This is obtained by finding a direction along which the Sibony metric tends to infinity as the base point tends to the boundary. The analogous statement fails for a Lipschitz boundary. For a general $\mathcal C^1$ boundary, we give estimates for the Sibony metric in terms of some directional distance functions. For bounded pseudoconvex domains, the Blocki-Zwonek Suita-type theorem implies growth to infinity of the Bergman kernel; the fact that the Bergman kernel grows as the square of the reciprocal of the distance to the boundary, proved by S. Fu in the $\mathcal C^2$ case, is extended to bounded pseudoconvex domains with Lipschitz boundaries., Comment: To appear in the Journal of Mathematical Analysis and its Applications

This survey shows how, for the Nevanlinna class N of the unit disc, one can define and often characterize the analogues of well-known objects and properties related to the algebra of bounded analytic functions $ H^\infty$: interpolating sequences, Corona theorem, sets of determination, stable rank, as well as the more recent notions of Weak Embedding Property and threshold of invertibility for quotient algebras. The general rule we observe is that a given result for $H^\infty$ can be transposed to N by replacing uniform bounds by a suitable control by positive harmonic functions. We show several instances where this rule applies, as well as some exceptions. We also briefly discuss the situation for the related Smirnov class., Comment: 3 pages

In the spirit of Kobayashi's applications of methods of invariant metrics to questions of projective geometry, we introduce a projective analogue of the complex squeezing function. Using Frankel's work, we prove that for convex domains it stays uniformly bounded from below. In the case of strongly convex domains, we show that it tends to 1 at the boundary. This is applied to get a new proof of a projective analogue of the Wong-Rosay theorem.

Let $\mathcal{N}$ be the Nevanlinna class and let $B$ be a Blaschke product. It is shown that the natural invertibility criterion in the quotient algebra $\mathcal{N} / B \mathcal{N}$, that is, $|f| \ge e^{-H} $ on the set $B^{-1}\{0\}$ for some positive harmonic function $H$, holds if and only if the function $- \log |B|$ has a harmonic majorant on the set $\{z\in\mathbb{D}:\rho(z,\Lambda)\geq e^{-H(z)}\}$; at least for large enough functions $H$. We also study the corresponding class of positive harmonic functions $H$ in the unit disc such that the latter condition holds. We also discuss the analogous invertibility problem in quotients of the Smirnov class.

It is proved that for any domain in $\mathbb C^n$ the Caratheodory--Eisenman volume is comparable with the volume of the indicatrix of the Caratheodory metric up to small/large constants depending only on $n.$ Then the "multidimensional Suita conjecture" theorem of Blocki and Zwonek implies a comparable relationship between these volumes and the Bergman kernel., Comment: 5 pages

Let $I$ be an inner function in the unit disk $\mathbb D$ and let $\mathcal N$ denote the Nevanlinna class. We prove that under natural assumptions, Bezout equations in the quotient algebra $\mathcal N/I\mathcal N$ can be solved if and only if the zeros of $I$ form a finite union of Nevanlinna interpolating sequences. This is in contrast with the situation in the algebra of bounded analytic functions, where being a finite union of interpolating sequences is a sufficient but not necessary condition. An analogous result in the Smirnov class is proved as well as several equivalent descriptions of Blaschke products whose zeros form a finite union of interpolating sequences in the Nevanlinna class., Comment: 22 pages

We use a special version of the Corona Theorem in several variables, valid when all but one of the data functions are smooth, to generalize to the polydisc and to the ball results obtained by El Fallah, Kellay and Seip about cyclicity of non vanishing bounded holomorphic functions in large enough Banach spaces of analytic functions determined either by weighted sums of powers of Taylor coefficients or by radially weighted integrals of powers of the modulus of the function., Comment: Version 3: we took into account a recent result of Michael Hartz which, in several variables, is a substitute for the von Neumann inequality. This extends a bit the range of our result. 22 pages, 1 figure

We extend the upper estimates obtained by M. Carlehed and B.-Y. Chen about the ratio of the classical and pluricomplex Green functions to the case of $\mathcal C^2$-smooth locally $\mathbb C$-convexifiable domains of finite type. We also give some lower estimates. In order to obtain those results, and because it is of independent interest, we refine and unify some classical estimates about the Kobayashi distance and the Lempert function in such domains., Comment: v3: Ann. Scuola Norm. Sup. Pisa Cl. Sci. (to appear)

The precise behavior of the quasi-hyperbolic metric near a $\mathcal C^{1,1}$-smooth part of the boundary of a domain in $\mathbb{R}^n$ is obtained., Comment: Ann. Acad. Sci. Fenn. Math. (to appear)

Following Gorkin, Mortini, and Nikolski, we say that an inner function $I$ in $H^\infty$ of the unit disc has the WEP property if its modulus at a point $z$ is bounded from below by a function of the distance from $z$ to the zero set of $I$. This is equivalent to a number of properties, and we establish some consequences of this for $H^\infty/IH^\infty$. The bulk of the paper is devoted to "wepable" functions, i.e. those inner functions which can be made WEP after multiplication by a suitable Blaschke product. We prove that a closed subset $E$ of the unit circle is of finite entropy (i.e. is a Beurling-Carleson set) if and only if any singular measure supported on $E$ gives rise to a wepable singular inner function. As a corollary, we see that singular measures which spread their mass too evenly cannot give rise to wepable singular inner functions. Furthermore, we prove that the stronger property of porosity of $E$ is equivalent to a stronger form of wepability ("easy wepability") for the singular inner functions with support in $E$. Finally, we find out the critical decay rate of masses of atomic measures (with no restrictions on support) guaranteeing that the corresponding singular inner functions are easily wepable., Comment: 25 p

We study the limits of pluricomplex Green functions with four poles tending to the origin in a hyperconvex domain, and the (related) limits of the ideals of holomorphic functions vanishing on those points. Taking subsequences, we always assume that the directions defined by pairs of points stabilize as they tend to $0$. We prove that in a generic case, the limit of the Green functions is always the same, while the limits of ideals are distinct (in contrast to the three point case). We also study some exceptional cases, where only the limits of ideals are determined. In order to do this, we establish a useful result linking the length of the upper or lower limits of a family of ideals, and its convergence., Comment: 16 pages

In the paper we show the equality between the Lempert function and the Green function with two poles with equal weights in the bidisc thus giving the positive answer to a conjecture of Coman in the simplest unknown case. Actually, a slightly more general equality is proven which in some sense is natural when studied from the point of view of the Nevanlinna-Pick problem in the bidisc.

The spectral unit ball $\Omega_n$ is the set of all $n\times n$ matrices with spectral radius less than $1$. Let $\pi(M) \in \mathbb C^n$ stand for the coefficients of its characteristic polynomial of $M$ (up to signs), i.e. the elementary symmetric functions of its eigenvalues. The symmetrized polydisk is $\mathbb G_n:=\pi(\Omega_n)$. When investigating Nevanlinna-Pick problems for maps from the disk to the spectral ball, it is often useful to project the map to the symmetrized polydisk (for instance to obtain continuity results for the Lempert function): if $\psi \in \mathcal O(\mathbb D, \Omega_n)$, then $\pi \circ \psi \in \mathcal O(\mathbb D, \mathbb G_n)$. Given a map $\varphi \in \mathcal O(\mathbb D, \mathbb G_n)$, we are looking for necessary and sufficient conditions for this map to "lift through given matrices", i.e. find $\psi$ as above so that $\pi \circ \psi = \varphi$ and $\psi (\alpha_j) = M_j$, $1\le j \le N$. A natural necessary condition is $\varphi(\alpha_j)=\pi(M_j)$, $1\le j \le N$. When the matrices $M_j$ are derogatory (i.e. do not admit a cyclic vector) new necessary conditions appear, involving derivatives of $\varphi$ at the points $\alpha_j$. Those conditions are necessary and sufficient for a local lift. We give a scheme which shows that the necessary conditions are also sufficient for a global lift in small dimensions (up to $5$), and a counter-example to show that the scheme fails in dimension $6$ (and above)., Comment: 22 pages; many small mistakes and typos fixed, thanks to the referee. To appear in Complex Analysis and Operator Theory

We continue the study of convergence of multipole pluricomplex Green functions for a bounded hyperconvex domain of $\mathbb C^n$, in the case where poles collide. We consider the case where all poles do not converge to the same point in the domain, and some of them might go to the boundary of the domain. We prove that weak convergence will imply convergence in capacity; that it implies convergence uniformly on compacta away from the poles when no poles tend to the boundary; and that the study can be reduced, in a sense, to the case where poles tend to a single point. Furthermore, we prove that the limits of Green functions can be obtained as limits of functions of the type $\max_{1\le i\le 3n} \frac{1}{p} \log |f_i|$, where the $f_i$ are holomorphic functions., Comment: To appear in Indiana University Mathematics Journal

We prove the non-hyperbolicity of the Kobayashi distance for $\mathcal{C}^{1,1}$-smooth convex domains in $\mathbb{C}^{2}$ which contain an analytic disc in the boundary or have a point of infinite type with rotation symmetry. Moreover, examples of smooth, non pseudoconvex, Gromov hyperbolic domains are given; we prove that the symmetrized polydisc and the tetrablock are not Gromov hyperbolic and write down some results about Gromov hyperbolicity of product spaces., Comment: 17 pages ; typos corrected, some proofs rewritten for clarity following the referee's comments. To appear in Forum Mathematicum

We construct an example to show that no condition of slow decrease of the modulus of a function is sufficient to make it cyclic in the Hardy space of the bidisc. This is similar to what is well known in the case of the Hardy space of the disc, but in contrast to the case of the Bergman space of the disc., Comment: 4 p

It is known (implicit in [HMNT]) that when $\Lambda$ is an interpolating sequence for the Nevanlinna or the Smirnov class then there exist functions $f_\lambda$ in these spaces, with uniform control of their growth and attaining values 1 on $\lambda$ and 0 in all other $\lambda'\neq\lambda$. We provide an example showing that, contrary to what happens in other algebras of holomorphic functions, the existence of such functions does not imply that $\Lambda$ is an interpolating sequence., Comment: 9 pages, 1 figure

Let us have a family of ideals of holomorphic functions vanishing at N distinct points of a complex manifold, all tending to a single point. As is known, convergence of the ideals does not guarantee the convergence of the pluricomplex Green functions to the Green function of the limit ideal; moreover, the existence of the limit of the Green functions was unclear. Assuming that all the powers of the ideals converge to some ideals, we prove that the Green functions converge, locally uniformly away from the limit pole, to a function which is essentially the upper envelope of the scaled Green functions of the limits of the powers. As examples, we consider ideals generated by hyperplane sections of a holomorphic curve near its singular point. In particular, our result explains recently obtained asymptotics for 3-point models., Comment: 15 pages; typesetting errors fixed

We investigate the limits of the ideals of holomorphic functions vanishing on three points in $\C^2$ when all three points tend to the origin, and what happens to the associated pluricomplex Green functions. This is a continuation of the work of Magnusson, Rashkovskii, Sigurdsson and Thomas, where those questions were settled in a generic case., Comment: 15 pages

Let $X$ be a complex space and $H$ a positive homogeneous plurisubharmonic function $H$ on $X\times\C^m$. Consider the Hartogs-type domain $\Omega_{H}(X):=\{(z,w)\in X\times \C^m:H(z,w)<1 \}$. Let $S$ be an analytic subset of $X$. We give necessary and sufficient conditions for hyperbolicity and tautness modulo $S\times \C^m$ of $\Omega_{H}(X)$, with the obvious corollaries for the special case of Hartogs domains., Comment: 10 pp

It is shown that a domain in $\C^n$ which is locally convex and has $\mathcal C^1$-smooth Levi-flat boundary is locally linearly equivalent to a Cartesian product of a planar domain and $\C^{n-1}.$ This result does not extend to the case where the Levi form has locally constant rank for some $k

A domain in $\C^n$ with Levi-flat boundary near a given point is characterized in terms of the boundary behavior of the Kobayashi or Bergman metrics, or of the Bergman kernel. Some results are given in the case of intermediate values of the rank of the Levi form., Comment: v2: We have added remarks comparing our results to the previous work of S. Fu, the relevance of which we had not realized

The Lempert function for a set of poles in a domain of $\mathbb C^n$ at a point $z$ is obtained by taking a certain infimum over all analytic disks going through the poles and the point $z$, and majorizes the corresponding multi-pole pluricomplex Green function. Coman proved that both coincide in the case of sets of two poles in the unit ball. We give an example of a set of three poles in the unit ball where this equality fails., Comment: v3: proof of the upper estimate for the Green function added; accepted in Pacific Journal of Mathematics

Let $S_\epsilon$ be a set of $N$ points in a bounded hyperconvex domain in $C^n$, all tending to 0 as$\epsilon$ tends to 0. To each set $S_\epsilon$ we associate its vanishing ideal $I_\epsilon$ and the pluricomplex Green function $G_\epsilon$ with poles on the set. Suppose that, as $\epsilon$ tends to 0, the vanishing ideals converge to $I$ (local uniform convergence, or equivalently convergence in the Douady space), and that $G_\epsilon$ converges to $G$, locally uniformly away from the origin; then the length (i.e. codimension) of $I$ is equal to $N$ and $G \ge G_I$. If the Hilbert-Samuel multiplicity of $I$ is strictly larger than $N$, then $G_\epsilon$ cannot converge to $G_I$. Conversely, if the Hilbert-Samuel multiplicity of $I$ is equal to $N$, (we say that $I$ is a complete intersection ideal), then $G_\epsilon$ does converge to $G_I$. We work out the case of three poles; when the directions defined by any two of the three points converge to limits which don't all coincide, there is convergence, but $G > G_I$., Comment: 41 p., version 2. A section linking our notion of convergence to the topology of the Douady space has been added. Some typos have been corrected

We prove that an open set $D$ in $\C^n$ is pseudoconvex if and only if for any $z\in D$ the largest balanced domain centered at $z$ and contained in $D$ is pseudoconvex, and consider analogues of that characterization in the linearly convex case., Comment: v2: Proposition 14 is improved; v3: Example 15 and the proof of Proposition 14 are changed

We prove that a $C^{1,1}$-smooth bounded domain $D$ in $\C^n$ is linearly convex if and only if the convex hull of any two discs in $D$ with common center lies in $D.$, Comment: to appear in Math. Scand.; v3: Appendix is added

The Green function of the spectral ball is constant over the isospectral varieties, is never less than the pullback of its counterpart on the symmetrized polydisk, and is equal to it in the generic case where the pole is a cyclic (non-derogatory) matrix. When the pole is derogatory, the inequality is always strict, and the difference between the two functions depends on the order of nilpotence of the strictly upper triangular blocks that appear in the Jordan decomposition of the pole. In particular, the Green function of the spectral ball is not symmetric in its arguments. Additionally, some estimates are given for invariant functions in the symmetrized polydisc, e.g. (infinitesimal versions of) the Carath\'eodory distance and the Green function, that show that they are distinct in dimension greater or equal to $3$., Comment: 12 pages

We find the precise growth of some invariant metrics near a point on the boundary of a domain where the Levi form has at least one negative eigenvalue. We also introduce a new invariant pseudometric which is convenient in this context, and give some of its general properties., Comment: v5: a lower estimate for the Kobayashi metric is added

The Nevanlinna-Pick problem and the simplest case of the Carath\'eodory-Fej\'er problem on the spectral ball $\Om_3$ are reduced to interpolation problems on the symmetrized three-disc $\G_3.$, Comment: v2: minor changes

We discuss some extremal bases for $\CC$-convex domains., Comment: Few typos have been corrected in v3

We find all matrices $A$ from the spectral unit ball $\Omega_n$ such that the Lempert function $l_{\Omega_n}(A,\cdot)$ is continuous., Comment: small corrections; one reference is added