On conformal manifolds of even dimension $n\geq 4$ we construct a family of new conformally invariant differential complexes. Each bundle in each of these complexes appears either in the de Rham complex or in its dual. Each of the new complexes is elliptic if the signature is Riemannian. We also construct gauge companion operators which complete the exterior derivative to a conformally invariant and (in the case of Riemannian signature) elliptically coercive system. These (operator,gauge) pairs are used to define finite dimensional conformally stable form subspaces which are are candidates for spaces of conformal harmonics. These constructions are based on a family of operators on closed forms which generalise in a natural way the Q-curvature. We give a universal construction of these new operators and show that they yield new conformally invariant global pairings between differential form bundles. Finally we give a geometric construction of a family of conformally invariant differential operators between density-valued differential form bundles and develop their properties (including their ellipticity type in the case of definite conformal signature). The construction is based on the ambient metric of Fefferman and Graham, and its relationship to tractor bundles. For each form order, our derivation yields an operator of every even order in odd dimensions, and even order operators up to order $n$ in even dimension $n$. In the case of unweighted forms as domain, these operators are the natural form analogues of the critical order conformal Laplacian of Graham et al., and are key ingredients in the new differential complexes mentioned above.
In this paper we generalize the basic Lichnerowicz cohomology on transversally locally conformally Kählerian foliations and we study its relation with basic Bott-Chern cohomology and $0$--th basic Dolbeault cohomology with values in the associated foliated weight bundle.
A Riemannian or pseudo-Riemannian (or conformal) structure is conformally Einstein if and only if there is a suitably generic parallel section of a certain vector bundle -- the so-called standard conformal tractor bundle. We show that this characterisation leads to a systematic approach to constructing obstructions to conformally Einstein metrics. Relaxing the requirement that the parallel tractor field be generic gives a natural generalisation of the Einstein equations.
We review the properties of the Morse-Novikov cohomology and compute it for all known compact complex surfaces with locally conformally Kähler metrics. We present explicit computations for the Inoue surfaces $\mathcal{S}^0$, $\mathcal{S}^+$, $\mathcal{S}^-$ and classify the locally conformally Kähler (and the tamed locally conformally symplectic) forms on $\mathcal{S}^0$. We prove the nonexistence of LCK metrics with potential and more generally, of $d_θ$-exact LCK metrics on Inoue surfaces and Oeljeklaus-Toma manifolds.
Conformally Einstein anti-self-dual spaces and their generalisations
Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, University of Cambridge（剑桥大学应用数学与理论物理系）；School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, University of Sheffield（谢菲尔德大学数学与物理科学学院）
We consider open manifolds which are interiors of a compact manifold with boundary, and Riemannian metrics asymptotic to a conformally cylindrical metric near the boundary. We show that the essential spectrum of the Laplace operator on functions vanishes under the presence of a magnetic field which does not define an integral relative cohomology class. It follows that the essential spectrum is not stable by perturbation even by a compactly supported magnetic field. We also treat magnetic operators perturbed with electric fields. In the same context we describe the essential spectrum of the $k$…
A locally conformally Kahler (LCK) manifold is a complex manifold admitting a Kahler covering, with the monodromy acting on this covering by homotheties. We define three cohomology invariants, the Lee class, the Morse-Novikov class, and the Bott-Chern class, of an LCK-structure. These invariants together play the same role as the Kahler class in Kahler geometry. If these classes for two LCK-structures coincide, the difference between these structures can be expressed by a smooth potential, similar to the Kahler case. We show that the Morse-Novikov class and the Bott-Chern class of a Vaisman ma…
For even dimensional conformal manifolds several new conformally invariant objects were found recently: invariant differential complexes related to, but distinct from, the de Rham complex (these are elliptic in the case of Riemannian signature); the cohomology spaces of these; conformally stable form spaces that we may view as spaces of conformal harmonics; operators that generalise Branson's Q-curvature; global pairings between differential form bundles that descend to cohomology pairings. Here we show that these operators, spaces, and the theory underlying them, simplify significantly on con…
We prove that the deRham cohomology classes of Lee forms of locally conformally symplectic structures taming the complex structure of a compact complex surface $S$ with first Betti number equal to $1$ is either a non-empty open subset of $H^1_{dR}(S, \mathbb R)$, or a single point. In the latter case, we show that $S$ must be biholomorphic to a blow-up of an Inoue-Bombieri surface. Similarly, the deRham cohomology classes of Lee forms of locally conformally Kähler structures of a compact complex surface $S$ with first Betti number equal to $1$ is either a non-empty open subset of $H^1_{dR}(S, …
There is a class of Laplacian like conformally invariant differential operators on differential forms $L^\ell_k$ which may be considered the generalisation to differential forms of the conformally invariant powers of the Laplacian known as the Paneitz and GJMS operators. On conformally Einstein manifolds we give explicit formulae for these as explicit factored polynomials in second order differential operators. In the case the manifold is not Ricci flat we use this to provide a direct sum decomposition of the null space of the $L^\ell_k$ in terms of the null spaces of mutually commuting second…
Given a contact manifold $M_#$ together with a transversal infinitesimal automorphism $ξ$, we show that any local leaf space $M$ for the foliation determined by $ξ$ naturally carries a conformally symplectic (cs-) structure. Then we show that the Rumin complex on $M_#$ descends to a complex of differential operators on $M$, whose cohomology can be computed. Applying this construction locally, one obtains a complex intrinsically associated to any manifold endowed with a cs-structure, which recovers the generalization of the so-called Rumin-Seshadri complex to the conformally symplectic setting.…
A new definition of canonical conformal differential operators $P_k$ ($k=1,2,...)$, with leading term a $k^{\rm th}$ power of the Laplacian, is given for conformally Einstein manifolds of any signature. These act between density bundles and, more generally, between weighted tractor bundles of any rank. By construction these factor into a power of a fundamental Laplacian associated to Einstein metrics. There are natural conformal Laplacian operators on density bundles due to Graham-Jenne-Mason-Sparling (GJMS). It is shown that on conformally Einstein manifolds these agree with the $P_k$ operato…
We describe an elementary algorithm for expressing, as explicit formulae in tractor calculus, the conformally invariant GJMS operators due to C.R. Graham et alia. These differential operators have leading part a power of the Laplacian. Conformal tractor calculus is the natural induced bundle calculus associated to the conformal Cartan connection. Applications discussed include standard formulae for these operators in terms of the Levi-Civita connection and its curvature and a direct definition and formula for T. Branson's so-called Q-curvature (which integrates to a global conformal invariant)…
We clarify the conformal invariance of the Pontrjagin forms by giving them a manifestly conformally invariant construction; they are shown to be the Pontrjagin forms of the conformally invariant tractor connection. The Q-curvature is intimately related to the Pfaffian. Working on even-dimensional manifolds, we show how the $k$-form operators $Q_k$ of \cite{ddd}, which generalise the Q-curvature, retain a key aspect of the $Q$-curvature's relation to the Pfaffian, by obstructing certain representations of natural operators on closed forms. In a closely related direction, we show that the $Q_k$ …
We discuss the Morse-Novikov cohomology of a compact manifold, associated to a closed one--form whose free abelian group generated by its periods $\langle \int_γη\mid [γ] \in π_1(M)\rangle$ is of rank 1, the focus being on locally conformally symplectic manifolds. In particular, we provide an explicit computation for the Inoue surface $\mathcal{S}^0$.
We construct continuously parametrised families of conformally invariant boundary operators on densities. These may also be viewed as conformally covariant boundary operators on functions and generalise to higher orders the first-order conformal Robin operator and an analogous third-order operator of Chang-Qing. Our families include operators of critical order on odd-dimensional boundaries. Combined with the (conformal Laplacian power) GJMS operators, a suitable selection of the boundary operators yields formally self-adjoint elliptic conformal boundary problems. Working on a conformal manifol…
This article gives a study of the higher-dimensional Penrose transform between conformally invariant massless fields on space-time and cohomology classes on twistor space, where twistor space is defined to be the space of projective pure spinors of the conformal group. We focus on the 6-dimensional case in which twistor space is the six-quadric Q in CP^7 with a view to applications to the self-dual (0,2)-theory. We show how spinor-helicity momentum eigenstates have canonically defined distributional representatives on twistor space (a story that we extend to arbitrary dimension). These give an…
Prescribing, by conformal transformation, the kth-elementary symmetric polynomial of the Schouten tensor $P$ to be constant is a generalisation of the Yamabe problem. On compact Riemannian n-manifolds we show that, for k between and including 3 and n, this prescription equation is an Euler-Lagrange equation of some action if and only if the structure is locally conformally flat.
With respect to the Dirac operator and the conformally invariant Laplacian, an explicit description of the inverse Penrose transform on Riemannian twistor spaces is given. A Dolbeault representative of cohomology on the twistor space is constructed from a solution of the field equation on the base manifold.
In this article we propose a new geometrization of the radiative phase space of asymptotically flat space-times: we show that the geometry induced on null-infinity by the presence of gravitational waves can be understood to be a generalisation of the tractor calculus of conformal manifolds adapted to the case of degenerate conformal metrics. It follows that the whole formalism is, by construction, manifestly conformally invariant. We first show that a choice of asymptotic shear amounts to a choice of linear differential operator of order two on the bundle of scales of null-infinity. We refer t…
Let $(M,F)$ be a Finsler manifold. We construct a 1-cocycle on $\Diff(M)$ with values in the space of differential operators acting on sections of some bundles, by means of the Finsler function $F.$ As an operator, it has several expressions: in terms of the Chern, Berwald, Cartan or Hashiguchi connection, although its cohomology class does not depend on them. This cocycle is closely related to the conformal Schwarzian derivatives introduced in our previous work. The second main result of this paper is to discuss some properties of the conformally invariant quantization map by means of a Sazak…
