Cohomology and multiplicative gaps for quasi-isometries of nilpotent groups

We construct two word metrics on the same seven-dimensional torsion-free nilpotent lattice whose asymptotic cones are isometric, but for which every quasi-isometry has multiplicative constant at least $1+\varepsilon$, for one fixed $\varepsilon>0$. We use a convex invariant of a fixed quasi-isometry