Some metrics on Teichmüller spaces of surfaces of infinite type

Lixin Liu, Athanase Papadopoulos

Published 2008-08-06, updated 2009-07-22Version 2

Unlike the case of surfaces of topologically finite type, there are several different Teichm\"uller spaces that are associated to a surface of topological infinite type. These Teichm\"uller spaces first depend (set-theoretically) on whether we work in the hyperbolic category or in the conformal category. They also depend, given the choice of a point of view (hyperbolic or conformal), on the choice of a distance function on Teichm\"uller space. Examples of distance functions that appear naturally in the hyperbolic setting are the length spectrum distance and the bi-Lipschitz distance, and there are other useful distance functions. The Teichm\"uller spaces also depend on the choice of a basepoint. The aim of this paper is to present some examples, results and questions on the Teichm\"uller theory of surfaces of infinite topological type that do not appear in the setting the Teichm\"uller theory of surfaces of finite type. In particular, we point out relations and differences between the various Teichm\"uller spaces associated to a given surface of topological infinite type.