Abstract:
In his 1956 paper, Selberg proved the famous Trace Formula for a semisimple Lie group
G and its discrete subgroup . The case when G = SL2(R) is quite well-known. In this
thesis, we look at the decomposition of L2(nG) into irreducible unitary representations of
G. The multiplicities of the spherical representations correspond to the eigenvalues of the
Laplacian on the locally symmetric space nG=K. Our aim will be to nd a nite threshold
on the multiplicity spectrum, or equivalently for the eigenvalue spectrum, which determines
the entire spectrum.