Pólya's conjecture for thin products

Abstract

Let $Ω\subset \mathbb R^d$ be a bounded Euclidean domain. According to the famous Weyl law, both its Dirichlet eigenvalue $λ_k(Ω)$ and its Neumann eigenvalue $μ_k(Ω)$ have the same leading asymptotics $w_k(Ω)=C(d,Ω)k^{2/d}$ as $k \to \infty$. G. Pólya conjectured in 1954 that each Dirichlet eigenvalue $λ_k(Ω)$ is greater than $w_k(Ω)$, while each Neumann eigenvalue $μ_k(Ω)$ is no more than $w_k(Ω)$. In this paper we prove Pólya's conjecture for thin products, i.e. domains of the form $(aΩ_1) \times Ω_2$, where $Ω_1, Ω_2$ are Euclidean domains, and $a$ is small enough. We also prove that the same inequalities hold if $Ω_2$ is replaced by a Riemannian manifold, and thus get Pólya's conjecture for a class of ``thin" Riemannian manifolds with boundary.