Tubes in complex hyperbolic manifolds

We prove a tubular neighborhood theorem for an embedded complex geodesic in a complex hyperbolic 2-manifold where the width of the tube depends only on the Euler characteristic χ of the embedded complex geodesic. We give an explicit estimate for this width. We supply two applications of the tubular neighborhood theorem. The first is a lower volume bound for such manifolds. The second is an upper bound on the first eigenvalue of the Laplacian in terms of the geometry of the manifold. Finally, we prove a geometric combination theorem for two C C -Fuchsian subgroups of PU ⁡ (2, 1) PU (2, 1). Using this combination theorem, we show that the optimal width size of a tube about an embedded complex geodesic is asymptotically bounded between 1 | χ | 1| | and 1 | χ | 1 {| |}.