In this paper we find all solvable subgroups of Diff^omega(S^1) and classify their actions. We also investigate the C^r local rigidity of actions of the solvable Baumslag-Solitar groups on the circle.
The investigation leads to two novel phenomena in the study of infinite group actions on compact manifolds. We exhibit a finitely generated group Gamma and a manifold M such that:
* Gamma has exactly countably infinitely many effective real-analytic actions on M, up to conjugacy in Diff^omega(M);
* every effective, real analytic action of Gamma on M is C^r locally rigid, for some r>=3, and for every such r, there are infinitely many nonconjugate, effective real-analytic actions of Gamma on M that are C^r locally rigid, but not C^(r-1) locally rigid.
We classify measures on a homogeneous space which are invariant under a certain solvable subgroup and ergodic under its unipotent radical. Our treatment is independent of characteristic. As a result we get the first measure classification for the action of semisimple subgroups without any characteristic restriction.
We give a sufficient condition for parameter rigidity of actions of solvable Lie groups, by vanishing of (uncountably many) first cohomologies of the orbit foliations. In some cases, we can prove that vanishing of finitely many cohomologies is sufficient. For this purpose we use a rigidity property of quasiisometry. As an application we prove some actions of 2-step solvable Lie groups on mapping tori are parameter rigid. Special cases of these actions are considered in a paper of Matsumoto and Mitsumatsu. We also remark on the relation between transitive locally free actions of solvable Lie gr…
An analog of the Baumslag-Solitar group BS(1,k) naturally acts on the sphere by conformal transformations. The action is not locally rigid in higher dimension, but exhibits a weak form of local rigidity. More precisely, any perturbation preserves a smooth conformal structure.
In this paper, we study a local rigidity property of $\mathbb Z \ltimes_λ\mathbb R$ affine action on tori generated by an irreducible toral automorphism and a linear flow along an eigenspace. Such an action exhibits a weak version of local rigidity, i.e., any smooth perturbations close enough to an affine action is smoothly conjugate to the affine action up to proportional time change.
Let $G$ be the group of orientation-preserving isometries of a rank-one symmetric space $X$ of non-compact type. We study local rigidity of certain actions of a solvable subgroup $Γ\subset G$ on the boundary of $X$, which is diffeomorphic to a sphere. When $X$ is a quaternionic hyperbolic space or the Cayley hyperplane, the action we constructed is locally rigid.
Let $M\stackrel{ρ_0}{\curvearrowleft}S$ be a $C^\infty$ locally free action of a connected simply connected solvable Lie group $S$ on a closed manifold $M$. Roughly speaking, $ρ_0$ is parameter rigid if any $C^\infty$ locally free action of $S$ on $M$ having the same orbits as $ρ_0$ is $C^\infty$ conjugate to $ρ_0$. In this paper we prove two types of result on parameter rigidity. First let $G$ be a connected semisimple Lie group with finite center of real rank at least $2$ without compact factors nor simple factors locally isomorphic to $\mathrm{SO}_0(n,1)$ $(n\geq2)$ or $\mathrm{SU}(n,1)$ $(…
We consider Abelian-by-cyclic groups for which the cyclic factor acts by hyperbolic automorphisms on the Abelian subgroup. We show that if such a group acts faithfully by $C^1$ diffeomorphisms of the closed interval with no global fixed point at the interior, then the action is topologically conjugated to that of an affine group. Moreover, in case of non-Abelian image, we show a rigidity result concerning the multipliers of the homotheties, despite the fact that the conjugacy is not necessarily smooth. Some consequences for non-solvable groups are proposed. In particular, we give new proofs/ex…
We study invariant probability measures on the homogeneous space $\mathrm{SL}_n(\mathbb R)/\mathrm{SL}_n(\mathbb Z)$ for the action of subgroups of $\mathrm{SL}_n(\mathbb R)$ of the form $SF$ where $F$ is generated by one parameter unipotent groups and $S$ is a one parameter $\mathbb R$-diagonalizable group normalizing $F$. Under the assumption that $S$ contains an element with only one eigenvalue less than one (counted with multiplicity) and others bigger than one we prove that all the $SF$ invariant and ergodic probability measures on $\mathrm{SL}_n(\mathbb R)/\mathrm{SL}_n(\mathbb Z)$ are h…
Let $Γ$ be a weakly irreducible higher rank lattice. In this paper, we will prove various rigidity results for the $Γ$-action following a philosophy of the Zimmer program. We provide new rigidity results including local and global rigidity of the $Γ$-action when $Γ$ does not have Property (T). The new ingredient is a dynamical cocycle super-rigidity theorem. It can be thought of as the generalization of Zimmer's cocycle super-rigidity theorem since it provides almost the same consequences dynamically and algebraically. This allows us to derive various our rigidity results using dynamical super…
In this paper, we study a natural class of groups that act as affine transformations of $\mathbb T^N$. We investigate whether these solvable, "abelian-by-cyclic," groups can act smoothly and nonaffinely on $\mathbb T^N$ while remaining homotopic to the affine actions. In the affine actions, elliptic and hyperbolic dynamics coexist, forcing a priori complicated dynamics in nonaffine perturbations. We first show, using the KAM method, that any small and sufficiently smooth perturbation of such an affine action can be conjugated smoothly to an affine action, provided certain Diophantine condition…
We give a criterion for the rigidity of actions on homogeneous spaces. Let $G$ be a real Lie group, $Λ$ a lattice in $G$, and $Γ$ a subgroup of the affine group Aff$(G)$ stabilizing $Λ$. Then the action of $Γ$ on $G/Λ$ has the rigidity property in the sense of S. Popa, if and only if the induced action of $Γ$ on $\mathbb{P}(\frak{g})$ admits no $Γ$-invariant probability measure, where $\frak{g}$ is the Lie algebra of $G$. This generalizes results of M. Burger, and A. Ioana and Y. Shalom. As an application, we establish rigidity for the action of a class of groups acting by automorphisms on nil…
We consider irreducible actions of locally compact product groups, and of higher rank semi-simple Lie groups. Using the intermediate factor theorems of Bader-Shalom and Nevo-Zimmer, we show that the action stabilizers, and all irreducible invariant random subgroups, are co-amenable in their normal closure. As a consequence, we derive rigidity results on irreducible actions that generalize and strengthen the results of Bader-Shalom and Stuck-Zimmer.
Actions of a locally compact group G on a measure space X give rise to unitary representations of G on Hilbert spaces. We review results on the rigidity of these actions from the spectral point of view, that is, results about the existence of a spectral gap for associated averaging operators and their consequences. We will deal both with spaces X with an infinite measure as well as with spaces with an invariant probability measure. The spectral gap property has several striking applications to group theory, geometry, ergodic theory, operator algebras, graph theory, theoretical computer science…
This text is an expanded series of lecture notes based on a 5-hour course given at the workshop entitled "Workshop for young researchers: Groups acting on manifolds" held in Teresópolis, Brazil in June 2016. The course introduced a number of classical tools in smooth ergodic theory -- particularly Lyapunov exponents and metric entropy -- as tools to study rigidity properties of group actions on manifolds. We do not present comprehensive treatment of group actions or general rigidity programs. Rather, we focus on two rigidity results in higher-rank dynamics: the measure rigidity theorem for aff…
For groups of diffeomorphisms of $\T^2$ containing an Anosov diffeomorphism, we give a complete classification for polycyclic Abelian-by-Cyclic group actions on $\T^2$ up to both topological conjugacy and smooth conjugacy under mild assumptions. Along the way, we also prove a Tits alternative type theorem for some groups of diffeomorphisms of $\T^2$.
We investigate rigidity of measurable structure for higher rank abelian algebraic actions. In particular, we show that ergodic measures for these actions fiber over a 0 entropy measure with Haar measures along the leaves. We deduce various rigidity theorems for isomorphisms and joinings as corollaries.
An algebraic $Z^{d}$-action is an action of $Z^{d}$ on a compact abelian group $X$ by automorphisms of $X$. We prove that for $d \ge 8$, there exist mixing zero entropy algebraic $Z^{d}$-actions which do not exhibit isomorphism rigidity property.
In this paper, we show local smooth rigidity for higher rank ergodic nilpotent action by toral automorphisms and prove the existence of such action on any torus TN for any even N ? 6. We also give examples of smooth rigidity of actions having rank-one factors. The method is a generalization of the KAM (Kolmogorov-Arnold-Moser) iterative scheme.
We show that all $C^\infty$ Anosov $Z^r$-actions on tori and nilmanifolds without rank-one factor actions are, up to $C^\infty$ conjugacy, actions by automorphisms.
In this paper we prove a perturbative result for a class of $\mathbb Z^2$ actions on Heisenberg nilmanifolds, which have Diophantine properties. Along the way we prove cohomological rigidity and obtain a tame splitting for the cohomology with coefficients in smooth vector fields for such actions.
We survey rigidity results for groups acting on the circle in various settings, from local to global and $C^0$ to smooth. Our primary focus is on actions of surface groups, with the aim of introducing the reader to recent developments and new tools to study groups acting by homeomorphisms.
We consider partially hyperbolic abelian algebraic high-rank actions on compact homogeneous spaces obtained from simple indefinite orthogonal and unitary groups. In the first part of the paper, we show local differentiable rigidity for such actions. The conclusions are based on progress towards computations of the Schur multipliers of these non-split groups, which is the main aim of the second part.
We prove several results concerning smooth $\mathbb R^k$ actions with the property that their leafwise Laplacian is globally hypoelliptic. Such actions are necessarily uniquely ergodic and minimal, and cohomology is often finite-dimensional, even trivial. Further we consider a class of examples of $\mathbb R^2$ actions on 2-step nilmanifolds, which have globally hypoelliptic leafwise Laplacian, and we show transversal local rigidity under certain Diophantine conditions.
We extend the recent progress on the cocycle rigidity of partially hyperbolic homogeneous abelian actions to the setting with rank 1 factors in the universal cover. The method of proof relies on the periodic cycle functional and analysis of the cycle structure, but uses a new argument to give vanishing.
Let G = SU(n,1), n >1 be the orientation-preserving isometry group of the complex hyperbolic space with an Iwasawa decomposition G = KAN. We prove local rigidity of a family of certain actions of a subgroup of AN on the imaginary boundary of the complex hyperbolic space.
We prove global rigidity results for some linear abelian actions on tori. The type of actions we deal with includes in particular maximal rank semisimple actions on $\T^N$.
We survey some recent developments and applications of the study of the rigidity properties of natural algebraic actions of multidimensional abelian groups.
Let $Γ$ be a discrete group with property $(T)$ of Kazhdan. We prove that any Riemannian isometric action of $Γ$ on a compact manifold $X$ is locally rigid. We also prove a more general foliated version of this result. The foliated result is used in our proof of local rigidity for standard actions of higher rank semisimple Lie groups and their lattices in \cite{FM2}. One definition of property $(T)$ is that a group $Γ$ has property $(T)$ if every isometric $Γ$ action on a Hilbert space has a fixed point. We prove a variety of strengthenings of this fixed point properties for groups with proper…
We prove that any smooth volume-preserving action of a lattice $Γ$ in $\textrm{SL}(n,\mathbb{R})$, $n\ge 3$, on a closed $n$-manifold which possesses one element that admits a dominated splitting should be standard. In other words, the manifold is the $n$-flat torus and the action is smoothly conjugate to an affine action. Note that an Anosov diffeomorphism, or more generally, a partial hyperbolic diffeomorphism admits a dominated splitting. We have a topological global rigidity when $α$ is $C^{1}$. Similar theorems hold for an action of a lattice in $\textrm{Sp}(2n,\mathbb{R})$ with $n\ge 2$ …
We prove that for any two continuous minimal (topologically free) actions of the infinite dihedral group on an infinite compact Hausdorff space, they are continuously orbit equivalent only if they are conjugate. We also show the above fails if we replace the infinite dihedral group with certain other virtually cyclic groups, e.g. the direct product of the integer group with any non-abelian finite simple group.
We prove that if a Borel probability measure (μ) on (\T) is invariant under the action of a "large" multiplicative semigroup (lower logarithmic density is positive) and the action of the whole semigroup is ergodic then (μ) is either Lebesgue or has finite support.
We prove absolute continuity of "high entropy" hyperbolic invariant measures for smooth actions of higher rank abelian groups assuming that there are no proportional Lyapunov exponents. For actions on tori and infranilmanifolds existence of an absolutely continuous invariant measure of this kind is obtained for actions whose elements are homotopic to those of an action by hyperbolic automorphisms with no multiple or proportional Lyapunov exponents. In the latter case a form of rigidity is proved for certain natural classes of cocycles over the action.
We show that ergodic affine abelian discrete actions on the torus, that have a rank-one factor in their linear part, are locally rigid in a KAM sense if and only if the rank one factor is trivial and the action is higher-rank transversally to this factor. Since it has been proved by Damjanovic and Katok that affine actions with higher-rank linear part are locally rigid, our result completes the local rigidity picture for affine actions on the torus.
We study smooth factors of the standard actions of lattices in higher rank semisimple Lie groups on flag manifolds. Under a mild condition on existence of a single differentiable sink, we show that these factors are $C^{\infty}$-conjugate to the standard actions on flag manifolds.
In this article we prove global rigidity results for hyperbolic actions of higher-rank lattices. Suppose $Γ$ is a lattice in semisimple Lie group, all of whose factors have rank $2$ or higher. Let $α$ be a smooth $Γ$-action on a compact nilmanifold $M$ that lifts to an action on the universal cover. If the linear data $ρ$ of $α$ contains a hyperbolic element, then there is a continuous semiconjugacy intertwining the actions of $α$ and $ρ$, on a finite-index subgroup of $Γ$. If $α$ is a $C^\infty$ action and contains an Anosov element, then the semiconjugacy is a $C^\infty$ conjugacy. As a coro…
We prove that every smooth action of Z^k, k>1, on the (k+1)-dimensional torus homotopic to an action by hyperbolic linear maps preserves an absolutely continuous measure. This is a first known result concerning abelian groups of diffeomorphisms where existence of an invariant geometric structure is obtained from homotopy data.
Let BS(n_1,m_1) $\curvearrowright$ X_1 and BS(n_2,m_2) $\curvearrowright$ X_2 be two ergodic essentially free probability measure preserving actions of nonamenable Baumslag-Solitar groups whose canonical almost normal abelian subgroups act aperiodically. We prove that an isomorphism between the corresponding crossed product II_1 factors forces BS(n_1,m_1) $\cong$ BS(n_2,m_2) when |n_1| $\neq$ |m_1| and BS(n_1,m_1) $\cong$ BS(n_2,$\pm$m_2) when |n_1| = |m_1|. This improves an orbit equivalence rigidity result obtained by Houdayer and Raum.
We show local and cocycle rigidity for $\R^k \times \Z^l$ partially hyperbolic translation actions on homogeneous spaces $\mc G/ Λ$. We consider a large class of actions whose geometric properties are more complicated than previously treated cases. It is also the first time that partially hyperbolic twisted symmetric space examples have been treated in the literature. The main new ingredient in the proof is a combination of geometric method and the theory of central extensions.
Let $Γ_A$ denote the abelian-by-cyclic group associated to an integer-valued, non-singular matrix $A$. We show that if $A$ has no eigenvalues of modulus one, then there are no faithful $C^1$ perturbations of the trivial action $ ι: Γ_A \to \diff$, where $M$ is a compact manifold.
Let $ G $ be a countable discrete group and consider a nonsingular Bernoulli shift action $ G \curvearrowright \prod_{g\in G }(\{0,1\},μ_g)$ with two base points. When $ G $ is exact, under a certain finiteness assumption on the measures $\{μ_g\}_{g\in G }$, we construct a boundary for the Bernoulli crossed product C$^*$-algebra that admits some commutativity and amenability in the sense of Ozawa's bi-exactness. As a consequence, we obtain that any such Bernoulli action is solid. This generalizes solidity of measure preserving Bernoulli actions by Ozawa and Chifan--Ioana, and is the first rigi…
The goal of this paper is to study ergodic and rigidity properties of smooth actions of the discrete Heisenberg group $\H$. We establish the decomposition of the tangent space of any $C^\infty$ compact Riemannian manifold $M$ for Lyapunov exponents, and show that all Lyapunov exponents for the center elements are zero. We obtain that if an $\H$ group action contains an Anosov element, then under certain conditions on the element, the center elements are of finite order. In particular there is no faithful codimensional one Anosov Heisenberg group action on any manifolds, and no faithful codimen…
Suppose $X_{1}, X_{2}$ are nilmanifolds and $ρ, σ$ are automorphism actions of a discrete group $Γ$ on $X_{1}$ and $X_{2}$ respectively. We show that if $(X_{1},ρ)$ and $(X_{2}, σ)$ satisfy certain additional conditions then every $Γ$-equivariant continuous map from $(X_{1},ρ)$ to $(X_{2},σ)$ is an affine map.
We prove the locally differentiable rigidity of generic partially hyperbolic abelian algebraic high-rank actions on compact homogeneous spaces obtained from split symplectic Lie groups. We also gave a non-generic action rigidity example on compact homogeneous spaces obtained from SL(2n,R) or SL(2n,C). The conclusions are based on geometric Katok-Damjanovic way and progress towards computations of the generating relations in these groups.
We prove that any real-analytic action of $SL(n,\Z), n\ge 3$ with standard homotopy data that preserves an ergodic measure $μ$ whose support is not contained in a ball, is analytically conjugate on an open invariant set to the standard linear action on the complement to a finite union of periodic orbits.
We study the rigidity properties of a class of algebraic Z^3-actions with entropy rank two. For this class, conditions are found which force an invariant measure to be the Haar measure on an affine subset. This is applied to show isomorphism rigidity for such actions, and to provide examples of non-isomorphic Z^3-actions with all their Z^2-sub-actions isomorphic. The proofs use lexicographic half-space entropies and total ergodicity along critical directions.
Consider homogeneous G/H and G/F, for an S-algebraic group G. A lattice Γ acts on the left strictly conservatively. The following rigidity results are obtained: morphisms, factors and joinings defined apriori only in the measurable category are in fact algebraically constrained. Arguing in an elementary fashion we manage to classify all the measurable Φ commuting with the Γ-action: assuming ergodicity, we find they are algebraically defined.
We show the following dichotomy for a linear parabolic $\mathbb Z^2$-action $ρ_L$ on the torus with at least one step-2 generator: (i) Any affine $\mathbb Z^2$-action with linear part $ρ_L$ has a $\mathbb Z$-factor that is either identity or genuinely parabolic, and is thus not KAM-rigid, or (ii) Almost every affine $\mathbb Z^2$-action with linear part $ρ_L$ is KAM-rigid under volume preserving perturbations.
We study the rigidity in the sense of Zimmer for higher rank lattice actions on dendrites and show that: (1) if $Γ$ is a higher rank lattice and $X$ is a nondegenerate dendrite with no infinite order points, then any action of $Γ$ on $X$ cannot be almost free; (2) if $Γ$ is further a finite index subgroup of $SL_n(\mathbb Z)$ with $n\geq 3$, then every action of $Γ$ on $X$ has a nontrivial almost finite subsystem. During the proof, we get a new characterization of the left-orderability of a finitely generated group through its actions on dendrites.
We study Popa's notion of rigidity for equivalence relations induced by actions on homogeneous spaces. For any lattices $Γ,Λ$ in a semisimple Lie group $G$ with finite center and no compact factors we prove that the action $Γ\curvearrowright G/Λ$ is rigid. If in addition $G$ has property (T) then we derive that the von Neumann algebra $L^{\infty}(G/Λ)\rtimesΓ$ has property (T). We also show that if the adjoint action of $G$ on the Lie algebra of $G$ - $\{0\}$ is amenable (e.g. if $G=SL_2(\Bbb R)$), then any ergodic subequivalence relation of the orbit equivalence relation of the action $Γ\curv…
We give a survey of recent classification results for crossed product von Neumann algebras arising from measure preserving group actions on probability spaces. This includes II_1 factors with uncountable fundamental groups and the construction of W*-superrigid actions where the crossed product entirely remembers the initial group action that it was constructed from.
We consider a totally nonsymplectic Anosov action of Z^k which is either uniformly quasiconformal or pinched on each coarse Lyapunov distribution. We show that such an action on a torus is C^\infty--conjugate to an action by affine automorphisms. We also obtain similar global rigidity results for actions on an arbitrary compact manifold assuming that the coarse Lyapunov foliations are jointly integrable.
