Topological complexity of symplectic manifolds

Abstract

We prove that the topological complexity of every symplectically atoroidal manifold is equal to twice its dimension. This is the analogue for topological complexity of a result of Rudyak and Oprea, who showed that the Lusternik–Schnirelmann category of a symplectically aspherical manifold equals its dimension. Symplectically hyperbolic manifolds are symplectically atoroidal, as are symplectically aspherical manifolds whose fundamental group does not contain free abelian subgroups of rank two. Thus we obtain many new calculations of topological complexity, including iterated surface bundles and symplectically aspherical manifolds with hyperbolic fundamental groups.