The greatest use of the Hahn-Banach theorem ever

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Rohil Prasad, Princeton University

In-Person Talk 

Let F denote a smooth p-dimensional foliation of a manifold M. Nearly fifty years ago, Dennis Sullivan used the Hahn-Banach theorem to demonstrate a duality between closed p-dimensional currents tangent to F and closed p-dimensional forms positive on the leaves of F. This turns out to be very useful.