Threshold phenomena and existence results for NLS ground states on metric graphs

We investigate the existence of ground states of prescribed mass, for the nonlinear Schrödinger energy on a noncompact metric graph G. While in some cases the topology of G may rule out or, on the contrary, guarantee the existence of ground states of any given mass, in general also some metric properties of G, and their quantitative relation with the actual value of the prescribed mass, are relevant as concerns the existence of ground states. This may give rise to interesting phase transitions from nonexistence to existence of ground states, when a certain quantity reaches a critical threshold.