Sharp stability in hypercontractivity estimates and logarithmic Sobolev inequalities

Abstract

We prove stability results in hypercontractivity estimates for the Hopf--Lax semigroup in $\mathbb R^n$ and apply them to deduce stability results for the Euclidean $L^p$-logarithmic Sobolev inequality for any $p>1$. As a main tool, we use recent stability results for the Pr\'ekopa--Leindler inequality, due to B\"or\"oczky and De (2021), Figalli and Ramos (2024) and Figalli, van Hintum, and Tiba (2025). Under mild assumptions on the functions, most of our stability results turn out to be sharp, as they are reflected in the optimal exponent $1/2$ both in the hypercontractivity and $L^p$-logarithmic Sobolev deficits, respectively. This approach also works for establishing stability of Gaussian hypercontractivity estimates and Gaussian logarithmic Sobolev inequality, respectively.