Math 6455 Oct 10, 20061
Differential Geometry I
Fall 2006, Georgia Tech
Lecture Notes 13
Integration on Manifolds, Volume, and Partitions of Unity
Suppose that we have an orientable Riemannian manifold (M, g) and a function
f : M → R. How can we define the integral of f on M ? First we answer this
question locally, i.e., if (U, φ) is a chart of M (which preserves the orientation of
M ), we define
Z Z q
φ
f dvg := f (φ−1 (x)) det(gij (φ−1 (x)))dx,
U φ(U )
where gij are the coefficients of the metric g in local coordinates (U, φ). Recall that
φ
gij (p) := g(Eiφ (p), Ejφ (p)), where Eiφ (p) := dφ−1
φ(p) (ei ).
Now note that if (V, ψ) is any other (orientation preserving)
R local chart of M , and
W := U ∩ V , then there are two ways to compute W f dvg , and for these to yield
the same answer we need to have
Z q Z q
−1 φ −1 −1 ψ
f (φ (x)) det(gij (φ (x)))dx = f (ψ (x)) det(gij (ψ −1 (x)))dx.
φ(W ) ψ(W )
(1)
To check whether the above expression is valid recall that the change variables
formula tells that if D ⊂ Rn is an open subset, f : D → R is some function, and
u : D → D is a diffeomorphism, then
Z Z
f (x) dx = f (u(x)) det(dux )dx.
D D
Now recall that, by the definition of manifolds, φ ◦ ψ −1 : ψ(W ) → φ(W ) is a diffeo-
morphism. So, by the change of variables formula, the integral on the left hand side
of (1) may be rewritten as
Z q
φ
f (ψ −1 (x)) det(gij (ψ −1 (x))) det(d(φ ◦ ψ)−1
x )dx.
ψ(W )
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Last revised: November 23, 2009
1
So for equality in (1) to hold we just need to check that
q q
ψ φ
−1
det(gij (ψ (x))) = det(gij (ψ −1 (x))) det(d(φ ◦ ψ −1 )x ),
for all x ∈ ψ(W ) or, equivalently,
q q
ψ φ
det(gij (p)) = det(gij (p)) det(d(φ ◦ ψ −1 )ψ(p) ), (2)
for all p ∈ W . To see that the above equality holds, let (aij ) be the matrix of the
linear transformation d(φ ◦ ψ −1 ) and note that
ψ
gij = g(dψ −1 (ei ), dψ −1 (ej ))
= g(dφ−1 ◦ d(φ ◦ ψ −1 )(ei ), dφ−1 ◦ d(φ ◦ ψ −1 )(ej ))
!
X X
= g dφ−1 ai` e` , dφ−1 ajk ek
` k
φ
X
= ail ajk g`k .
`k
ψ φ ψ φ
So if (gij ) and (gij ) denote the matrices with the coefficients gij and gij , then we
have
ψ φ
(gij ) = (aij )(aij )(gij ).
Taking thepdeterminant of both sides of the above equality yields (2). In particular
note that det(aij )2 = | det(aij )| = det(aij ), because, since M is orientable and φ
and ψ are by assumption orientation preserving charts, det(aij ) > 0.
Next we discuss, how to integrate a function on all of M . To see this we need
the notion of partition of unity which may be defined as follows: Let Ui , i ∈ I, be
an open cover of M , then by a (smooth) partition of unity subordinate to Ui we
mean a collection of smooth functions θi : M → R with the following properties:
1. supp θi ⊂ Ai .
2. for any p ∈ M there exists only finitely many i ∈ I such that θi (p) 6= 0.
P
3. i∈I θi (p) = 1, for all p ∈ M .
Here supp denotes support, i.e., the closure of the set of points where a given function
is nonzero. Further note that by property 2 above, the sum in item 3 is well-defined.
Theorem 0.1. If M is any smooth manifold, then any open covering of M admits
a subordinate smooth partition of unity.
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Using
R the above theorem, whose proof we postpone for the time being, we may
define M f dvg , for any function f : M → R as follows. Cover M by a family of
local charts (Ui , φi ), and let θi be a subordinate partition of unity. Then we set
Z XZ
f dvg := θi f dvg .
M i∈I Ui
Note that this defintion does not depend on the choice of local charts or the cor-
responding partitions of unity. The volume of any orientable Riemannian manifold
may now be defined as the integral of the constant function one:
Z
vol(M ) := dvg .
M
Now we proceed towards proving Theorem 0.1.
Exercise 0.2. Compute the area of a torus of revolution in R3 .
Lemma 0.3. Any open cover of a manifold has a countable subcover.
Proof. Suppose that Ui , i ∈ I, is an open covering of a manifold M (where I is
an arbitrary set). By defintion, M has a countable basis B = {Bj }j∈J . For every
i ∈ I, let Ai := {Bj | Bj ⊂ Ui }. Then Ai is an open covering for M . Next, let
A := ∪i∈I Ai . Since A ⊂ B, A is countable, so we may denote the elements of A
by Ak , where k = 1, 2, . . . . Note that Ak is still an open covering for M . Further,
for each k there exists an i ∈ I such that Ak ⊂ Ui . We may collect all such Ui and
reindex them by k, which gives the desired countable subcover.
Lemma 0.4. Any manifold has a countable basis such that each basis element has
compact closure.
Proof. By the previous lemma we may cover any manifold M by a countable col-
lection of charts (Ui , φi ). Let Vj be a countable basis of Rn such that each Vj
has compact closure V j , e.g., let Vj be the set of balls in Rn centered at rational
points and with rational radii less than 1. Then Bij := φ−1 i (Vj ) gives a countable
basis for Ui such that each basis element has compact closure, since B ij = φ−1i (V j ).
So ∪ij Bij gives the desired basis, since a countable collection of countable sets is
countable.
Lemma 0.5. Any manifold M is countable at infinity, i.e., there exists a countable
collection of compact subsets Ki of M such that M ⊂ ∪i Ki and Ki ⊂ int Ki+1 .
Proof. Let Bi be the countable basis of M given by the previous lemma, i.e., with
each B i compact. Set K1 := B 1 and let Ki+1 := ∪rj=1 B j , where r is the smallest
integer such that Ki ⊂ ∪rj=1 Bj .
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By a refinement of an open cover Ui of M we mean an open cover Vj such that
for each j ∈ J there exists i ∈ I with Vj ⊂ Ui . We say that an open covering is
locally finite, if for every p ∈ M there exists finitely many elements of that covering
which contain p.
Lemma 0.6. Any open covering of a manifold M has a countable locally finite
refinement by charts (Ui , φi ) such that φi (Ui ) = B3n (o) and Vi := φ−1 (B1n (o)) also
cover M .
Proof. First note that for every point p ∈ M , we may find a local chart (Up , φp )
such that φp (Up ) = B3n (o), and set Vp := φ−1 (B1n (o)). Further, we may require that
Up lies inside any given open set which contains p. Let Aα be an open covering for
M . By a previous lemma, after replacing Aα by a subcover, we may assume that
Aα is countable. Now consider the sets Aα ∩ (int Ki+2 − Ki−1 ). Since Ki+1 − int Ki
is compact, there exists a finite number of open sets Upα,i j ⊂ Aα ∩ (int Ki+2 − Ki−1 )
such that Vpα,i
j covers A α ∩ (K i+1 − int Ki ). Since K i and Aα are countable, the
collection Upj is a countable. Further, by construction Upα,i
α,i
j is locally finite, so it is
the desired refinement.
Note 0.7. The last result shows in particular that every manifold is paracompact,
i.e., every open cover of M has a locally finite refinement.
Proof of Theorem 0.1. Let Aα be an open cover of M . Note that if Ui is any refine-
ment of Aα and θi is a partition of unity subordinate to Ui then, θi is subordinate to
Aα . In particular, it is enough to show that the refinement Ui given by the previous
lemma has a subordinate partition of unity. To this end note that there exists a
smooth nonnegative function f : R → R such that f (x) = 0 for x ≥ 2, and f (x) = 1
for x ≤ 1. Define θi : M → R by θi (p) := f (kφi (p)k)
P if p ∈ Ui and θi (p) := 0 other-
wise. Then θi are smooth. Finally, θi (p) := θi (p)/ j θj (p), is the desired partition
of unity.
Recall that earlier we showed that any compact manifold admits a Riemannian
metric, since it can be isometrically embedded in some Euclidean space. As an
application of the previous result we now ca n show:
Corollary 0.8. Any manifold admits a Riemannian metric
Proof. Let (Ui , φi ) be an atlas of M , and let θi be a subordinate partition of unity.
Now for p∈ Ui define gpi (X, Y ) := hdφi (X),
P dφi (Y )i. Then we define a Riemannian
metric g on M by setting gp (X, Y ) := i θi (p)gpi (X, Y ).
Exercise 0.9. Show that every manifold is normal, i.e., for every disjoint closed
sets A1 , A2 in M there exists a pair of disjoint open subsets U1 , U2 of M such that
X1 ⊂ U1 and X2 ⊂ U2 . [Hint: Use the fact that every manifold admits a metric]
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Exercise 0.10. Show that if U is any open subset of a manifold M and A ⊂ U is
a closed subset, then there exists smooth function f : M → R such that f = 1 on A
and f = 0 on M − U .
Exercise 0.11. Compute the volume (area) of a torus of revolution in R3 .
Exercise 0.12. Let M ⊂ Rn be an embedded submanifold which may be param-
eterized by f : U → Rn , for some open set U ⊂ Rm , i.e.,
R fpis a one-to-one smooth
immersion and f (U ) = M . Show that then vol(M ) = U det(Jx (f ) · Jx (f )T ) dx,
where Jx (f ) is the jacobian matrix of f at x.
