Semiclassical resolvent estimates in chaotic scattering

Abstract

We prove resolvent estimates for semiclassical operators such as $-h^2 \Delta+V(x)$ in scattering situations. Provided the set of trapped classical trajectories supports a chaotic flow and is sufficiently filamentary, the analytic continuation of the resolvent is bounded by $h^{-M}$ in a strip whose width is determined by a certain topological pressure associated with the classical flow. This polynomial estimate has applications to local smoothing in Schr\"odinger propagation and to energy decay of solutions to wave equations.