Genericity results for singular curves

Abstract

Let M be a smooth manifold and Dm, m ≥ 2, be the set of rank m distributions on M endowed with the Whitney C∞ topology. We show the existence of an open set Om dense in Dm, so that every nontrivial singular curve of a distribution D of Om is of minimal order and of corank one. In particular, for m ≥ 3, every distribution of Om does not admit nontrivial rigid curves. As a consequence, for generic sub-Riemannian structures of rank greater than or equal to three, there do not exist nontrivial minimizing singular curves. © 2006 Journal of Differential Geometry.