Simplicial volume, Barycenter method, and Bounded cohomology

Abstract

We show that codimension one dimensional Jacobian of the barycentric straightening map is uniformly bounded for most of the higher rank symmetric spaces. As a consequence, we prove that the locally finite simplicial volume of most $\mathbb Q$-rank $1$ locally symmetric spaces is positive, which has been open for many years. Finally we improve the degree theorem for $\mathbb Q$-rank $1$ locally symmetric spaces of Connell and Farb. We also address the issue of surjectivity of the comparison map in real rank $2$ case.