Initial data engineering

We present a local gluing construction for general relativistic initial data sets. The method applies to generic initial data, in a sense which is made precise. In particular the trace of the extrinsic curvature is not assumed to be constant near the gluing points, which was the case for previous such constructions. No global conditions on the initial data sets such as compactness, completeness, or asymptotic conditions are imposed. As an application, we prove existence of spatially compact, maximal globally hyperbolic, vacuum space-times without any closed constant mean curvature spacelike hypersurface.