Vanishing of the second $L^p$-cohomology group for most semisimple groups of rank at least 3

Abstract

We show vanishing of the second $L^p$-cohomology group for most semisimple algebraic groups of rank at least 3 over local fields. More precisely, we show this result for $\SL(4)$, for simple groups of rank $\ge 4$ that are not of exceptional type or of type $D_4$ and for all semisimple, non-simple groups of rank $\ge 3$. Our methods work for large values of $p$ in the real case and for all $p>1$ in the non-Archimedean case. This result points towards a positive answer to Gromov's question on vanishing of $L^p$-cohomology of semisimple groups for all $p>1$ in degrees below the rank. The methods consist in using a spectral sequence à la Bourdon-Rémy, adapting a version of Mautner's phenomenon from Cornulier-Tessera and concluding thanks to a combinatorial case-by-case study of classical simple groups.

30 pages, 3 tables. Changes in version 2: some proofs in section 2 have been simplified, some minor typos were corrected and author affiliation is updated