This is an expanded version of a series of lectures delivered at the 25th Winter School ``Geometry and Physics'' in Srni.
After a short introduction to Cartan geometries and parabolic geometries, we give a detailed description of the equivalence between parabolic geometries and underlying geometric structures.
The second part of the paper is devoted to constructions which relate parabolic geometries of different type. First we discuss the construction of correspondence spaces and twistor spaces, which is related to nested parabolic subgroups in the same semisimple Lie group. An example related to twistor theory for Grassmannian structures and the geometry of second order ODE's is discussed in detail.
In the last part, we discuss analogs of the Fefferman construction, which relate geometries corresponding different semisimple Lie groups.
We show that infinitesimal automorphisms and infinitesimal deformations of parabolic geometries can be nicely described in terms of the twisted de-Rham sequence associated to a certain linear connection on the adjoint tractor bundle. For regular normal geometries, this description can be related to the underlying geometric structure using the machinery of BGG sequences. In the locally flat case, this leads to a deformation complex, which generalizes the is well know complex for locally conformally flat manifolds. Recently, a theory of subcomplexes in BGG sequences has been developed. This appl…
We prove that the only complex parabolic geometries on Calabi-Yau manifolds are the homogeneous geometries on complex tori. We also classify the complex parabolic geometries on homogeneous compact Kähler manifolds.
Complete complex parabolic geometries (including projective connections and conformal connections) are flat and homogeneous. This is the first global theorem on parabolic geometries.
We consider automorphisms of homogeneous parabolic geometries with a fixed point. Parabolic geometries carry the distinguished distributions and we study those automorphisms which enjoy natural actions on the distributions at the fixed points. We describe the sets of such automorphisms on homogeneous parabolic geometries in detail and classify, whether there are non--flat homogeneous parabolic geometries carrying such automorphisms. We present two general constructions of such geometries and we provide complete classifications for the types (G,P) of the parabolic geometries that have G simple …
We investigate (local) automorphisms of parabolic geometries that generalize geodesic symmetries. We show that many types of parabolic geometries admit at most one generalized geodesic symmetry at a point with non-zero harmonic curvature. Moreover, we show that if there is exactly one symmetry at each point, then the parabolic geometry is a generalization of an affine (locally) symmetric space.
We give a simple characterization of the parabolic geodesics introduced by Cap, Slovak and Zadnik for all parabolic geometries. This goes through the definition of a natural connection on the space of Weyl structures. We then show that parabolic geodesics can be characterized as the following data: a curve on the manifold and a Weyl structure along the curve, so that the curve is a geodesic for its companion Weyl structure and the Weyl structure is parallel along the curve and in the direction of the tangent vector of the curve.
Every holomorphic effective parabolic or reductive geometry on a domain over a Stein manifold extends uniquely to the envelope of holomorphy of the domain. This result completes the open problems of my earlier paper on extension of holomorphic geometric structures on complex manifolds. We use this result to classify the Hopf manifolds which admit holomorphic reductive geometries, and to classify the Hopf manifolds which admit holomorphic parabolic geometries. Every Hopf manifold which admits a holomorphic parabolic geometry with a given model admits a flat one. We classify flat holomorphic par…
We use the general theory developed in our article arXiv:1208.5510 in the setting of parabolic geometries to reprove known results on special infinitesimal automorphisms of projective and conformal geometries.
In this paper we study a novel class of parabolic geometries which we call parabolic geometries of Monge type. These parabolic geometries are defined by special gradings of simple Lie algebras, namely, gradings with the property that their -1 component contains a nonzero co-dimension 1 abelian subspace whose bracket with its complement is non-degenerate. We completely classify the simple Lie algebras with such gradings in terms of elementary properties of the defining set of simple roots. We then characterize those parabolic geometries of Monge type which are non-rigid in the sense that, apart…
Motivated by the rich geometry of conformal Riemannian manifolds and by the recent development of geometries modeled on homogeneous spaces $G/P$ with $G$ semisimple and $P$ parabolic, Weyl structures and preferred connections are introduced in this general framework. In particular, we extend the notions of scales, closed and exact Weyl connections, and Rho--tensors, we characterize the classes of such objects, and we use the results to give a new description of the Cartan bundles and connections for all parabolic geometries.
We generalize the concept of affine locally symmetric spaces for parabolic geometries. We discuss mainly $|1|$--graded geometries and we show some restrictions on their curvature coming from the existence of symmetries. We use the theory of Weyl structures to discuss more interesting $|1|$--graded geometries which can carry a symmetry in a point with nonzero curvature. More concretely, we discuss the number of different symmetries which can exist at the point with nonzero curvature.
We investigate geometric properties of homogeneous parabolic geometries with generalized symmetries. We show that they can be reduced to a simpler geometric structures and interpret them explicitly. For specific types of parabolic geometries, we prove that the reductions correspond to known generalizations of symmetric spaces. In addition, we illustrate our results on an explicit example and provide a complete classification of possible non--trivial cases.
We define the infinitesimal and geometric orders of an effective Klein geometry G/H. Using these concepts, we prove i) For any integer m>1, there exists an effective Klein geometry G/H of infinitesimal order m such that G/H is a projective variety (Corollary 9). ii) An effective Klein geometry G/H of geometric order M defines a differential equation of order M+1 on G/H whose global solution space is G (Proposition 18).
We present the linearized metrizability problem in the context of parabolic geometries and subriemannian geometry, generalizing the metrizability problem in projective geometry studied by R. Liouville in 1889. We give a general method for linearizability and a classification of all cases with irreducible defining distribution where this method applies. These tools lead to natural subriemannian metrics on generic distributions of interest in geometric control theory.
All parabolic geometries, i.e. Cartan geometries with homogeneous model a real generalized flag manifold, admit highly interesting classes of distinguished curves. The geodesics of a projective class of connections on a manifold, conformal circles on conformal Riemannian manifolds, and Chern--Moser chains on CR--manifolds of hypersurface type are typical examples. We show that such distinguished curves are always determined by a finite jet in one point, and study the properties of such jets. We also discuss the question when distinguished curves agree up to reparametrization and discuss the di…
We construct infinite families of regular normal Cartan geometries with nonvanishing curvature and essential automorphisms on closed manifolds for many higher rank parabolic model geometries. To do this, we use particular elements of the kernel of the Kostant Laplacian to construct homogeneous Cartan geometries of the desired type, giving a global realization of an elegant local construction due to Kruglikov and The, and then modify these homogeneous geometries to make their base manifolds compact. As a demonstration, we apply the construction to quaternionic contact structrures of mixed signa…
First we introduce a generalization of symmetric spaces to parabolic geometries. We provide construction of such parabolic geometries starting with classical symmetric spaces and we show that all regular parabolic geometries with smooth systems of involutive symmetries can be obtained this way. Further, we investigate the case of parabolic contact geometries in great detail and we provide the full classification of those with semisimple groups of symmetries without complex factors. Finally, we explicitly construct all non-trivial contact geometries with non-complex simple groups of symmetries.…
We establish 2-jet determinacy for the symmetry algebra of the underlying structure of any (complex or real) parabolic geometry. At non-flat points, we prove that the symmetry algebra is in fact 1-jet determined. Moreover, we prove 1-jet determinacy at any point for a variety of non-flat parabolic geometries - in particular torsion-free, parabolic contact, and several other classes.
This article studies the fundamental invariants of 2--nondegenerate CR geometries with simple models. We show that there are two sources of these invariants. The first source is the harmonic curvature of the parabolic geometry that appears (locally) on the leaf space of the Levi kernel. The second source is the difference between the complex structure on the complex tangent space of the CR geometry and the complex structure on the correspondence space to the underlying parabolic geometry. We show that the later fundamental invariants appear only when the model is generic and if they vanish, th…
The principal group of a Klein geometry has canonical left action on the homogeneous space of the geometry and this action induces action on the spaces of sections of vector bundles over the homogeneous space. This paper is about construction of differential operators invariant with respect to the induced action of the principal group of a particular type of parabolic geometry. These operators form sequences which are related to the minimal resolutions of the k-Dirac operators studied in Clifford analysis.
We prove for the automorphism group of an arbitrary parabolic geometry that the $C^0$ and $C^{\infty}$ topologies coincide, and the group admits the structure of a Lie group in this topology. We further show that this automorphism group is closed in the homeomorphism group of the underlying manifold.
We study vector fields generating a local flow by automorphisms of a parabolic geometry with higher order fixed points. We develop general tools extending the techniques of [1], [2], and [3]. We apply these tools to almost Grassmannian, almost quaternionic, and contact parabolic geometries, including CR structures, to obtain descriptions of the possible dynamics of such flows near the fixed point and strong restrictions on the curvature. In some cases, we can show vanishing of the curvature on a nonempty open set. Deriving consequences for a specific geometry entails evaluating purely algebrai…
This note aims to demonstrate that every parabolic geometry has a naturally defined per-Courant algebroïd structure. This structure is a Courant algebroïd if and only if the the curvature $κ$ of the Cartan connection vanishes. In all other cases, if the parabolic geometry is regular, there does not exist a natural universal expression for a Courant bracket.
Some of the well known Fefferman like constructions of parabolic geometries end up with a new structure on the same manifold. In this paper, we classify all such cases with the help of the classical Onishchik's lists \cite{onish1} and we treat in detail the only new series of inclusions providing the spinorial structures on the manifolds with generic free distributions. Our technique relies on the cohomological understanding of the canonical normal Cartan connections for parabolic geometries and the classical computations with exterior forms. Apart of the complete discussion of the distributio…
The aim of this article is the proof of the following result: Let M be a connected manifold endowed with a regular Cartan geometry modelled on the boundary X of the d-dimensional real (resp. complex, resp. quaternionic, resp. octonionic) hyperbolic space. If the group of automorphisms of M does not act properly on M, then M is geometrically isomorphic to: - X if M is compact. - X minus a point in the other cases.
We study the local geometry of irreducible parabolic geometries admitting strongly essential flows; these are flows by local automorphisms with higher-order fixed points. We prove several new rigidity results, and recover some old ones for projective and conformal structures, which show that in many cases the existence of a strongly essential flow implies local flatness of the geometry on an open set having the fixed point in its closure. For almost c-projective and almost quaternionic structures we can moreover show flatness of the geometry on a neighborhood of the fixed point.
We present a uniform framework generalising and extending the classical theories of projective differential geometry, c-projective geometry, and almost quaternionic geometry. Such geometries, which we call \emph{projective parabolic geometries}, are abelian parabolic geometries whose flat model is an R-space $G\cdot\mathfrak{p}$ in the infinitesimal isotropy representation $\mathbb{W}$ of a larger self-dual symmetric R-space $H\cdot\mathfrak{q}$. We also give a classification of projective parabolic geometries with $H\cdot\mathfrak{q}$ irreducible which, in addition to the aforementioned class…
The chains studied in this paper generalize Chern-Moser chains for CR structures. They form a distinguished family of one dimensional submanifolds in manifolds endowed with a parabolic contact structure. Both the parabolic contact structure and the system of chains can be equivalently encoded as Cartan geometries (of different types). The aim of this paper is to study the relation between these two Cartan geometries for Lagrangean contact structures and partially integrable almost CR structures. We develop a general method for extending Cartan geometries which generalizes the Cartan geometry i…
The infinitesimal symmetry algebra of any Cartan geometry has maximum dimension realized by the flat model, but often this dimension drops significantly when considering non-flat geometries, so a gap phenomenon arises. For general (regular, normal) parabolic geometries of type (G,P), we use Tanaka theory to derive a universal upper bound on the submaximal symmetry dimension. We use Kostant's version of the Bott-Borel-Weil theorem to show that this bound is in fact sharp in almost all complex and split-real cases by exhibiting (abstract) models. We explicitly compute all submaximal symmetry dim…
We study here systems of symmetries on $|1|$--graded parabolic geometries. We are interested in smooth systems of symmetries and we discuss non--flat homogeneous $|1|$--graded geometries. We show the existence of an invariant admissible affine connection under quite weak condition on the system.
Ray nil-affine geometries are defined on nilpotent spaces. They occur in every parabolic geometry and in those cases, the nilpotent space is an open dense subset of the corresponding flag manifold. We are interested in closed manifolds having a ray nil-affine structure. We show that under a rank one condition on the isotropy, closed manifolds are either complete or their developing map is a cover onto the complement of a nil-affine subspace. We prove that if additionally there is a parallel volume or if the automorphism group acts non properly then closed manifolds are always complete.This pap…
A cone structure on a complex manifold $M$ is a closed submanifold $\mathcal C \subset \mathbb P TM$ of the projectivized tangent bundle which is submersive over $M$. A conic connection on $\mathcal C$ specifies a distinguished family of curves on $M$ in the directions specified by $\mathcal C$. There are two common sources of cone structures and conic connections, one in differential geometry and another in algebraic geometry. In differential geometry, we have cone structures induced by the geometric structures underlying holomorphic parabolic geometries, a classical example of which is the n…
In this paper, we show that associated to any coisotropic Cartan geometry there is a twisted Courant algebroid. This includes in particular parabolic geometries. Using this twisted Courant structure, we give some new results about the Cartan curvature and the Weyl structure of a parabolic geometry. As more direct applications, we have Lie 2-algebra and 3D AKSZ sigma model with background associated to any coisotropic Cartan geometry.
For a semisimple Lie group $G$ with parabolic subgroups $Q\subset P\subset G$, we associate to a parabolic geometry of type $(G,P)$ on a smooth manifold $N$ the correspondence space $\Cal CN$, which is the total space of a fiber bundle over $N$ with fiber a generalized flag manifold, and construct a canonical parabolic geometry of type $(G,Q)$ on $\Cal CN$. Conversely, for a parabolic geometry of type $(G,Q)$ on a smooth manifold $M$, we construct a distribution corresponding to $P$, and find the exact conditions for its integrability. If these conditions are satisfied, then we define the twis…
This thesis is concerned with the theory of invariant bilinear differential pairings on parabolic geometries. It introduces the concept formally with the help of the jet bundle formalism and provides a detailed analysis. More precisely, after introducing the most important notations and definitions, we first of all give an algebraic description for pairings on homogeneous spaces and obtain a first existence theorem. Next, a classification of first order invariant bilinear differential pairings is given under exclusion of certain degenerate cases that are related to the existence of invariant l…
This paper attempts to define a generalisation of the standard Einstein condition (in conformal/metric geometry) to any parabolic geometry. To do so, it shows that any preserved involution $σ$ of the adjoint bundle $\mc{A}$ gives rise, given certain algebraic conditions, to a unique preferred affine connection $\nabla$ with covariantly constant rho-tensor $\mathsf{P}$, compatible with the algebraic bracket on $\mc{A}$. These conditions can reasonably be considered the generalisations of the Einstein condition, and recreate the standard Einstein condition in conformal geometry. The existence of…
The classical concept of affine locally symmetric spaces allows a generalization for various geometric structures on a smooth manifold. We remind the notion of symmetry for parabolic geometries and we summarize the known facts for $|1|$--graded parabolic geometries and for almost Grassmannian structures, in particular. As an application of two general constructions with parabolic geometries, we present an example of non--flat Grassmannian symmetric space. Next we observe there is a distinguished torsion--free affine connection preserving the Grassmannian structure so that, with respect to this…
We introduce and discuss (local) symmetries of geometric structures. These symmetries generalize the classical (locally) symmetric spaces to various other geometries. Our main tools are homogeneous Cartan geometries and their explicit description. This allows us to describe the structure of symmetric geometric structures and to provide a general construction of such structures. Since we can view the classical (locally) symmetric spaces as special case, this allows us to classify various geometric structures on semisimple symmetric spaces. Then we investigate the case of symmetric parabolic geo…
There are only some exceptional CR dimensions and codimensions such that the geometries enjoy a discrete classification of the pointwise types of the homogeneous models. The cases of CR dimensions $n$ and codimensions $n^2$ are among the very few possibilities of the so called parabolic geometries. Indeed, the homogeneous model turns out to be $\PSU(n+1,n)/P$ with a suitable parabolic subgroup $P$. We study the geometric properties of such real $(2n+n^2)$-dimensional submanifolds in $\mathbb C^{n+n^2}$ for all $n>1$. In particular we show that the fundamental invariant is of torsion type, we p…
The current paper is devoted to the study of integral curves of constant type in parabolic homogeneous spaces. We construct a canonical moving frame bundle for such curves and give the criterium when it turns out to be a Cartan connection. Generalizations to parametrized curves, to higher-dimensional submanifolds and to general parabolic geometries are discussed.
Given a parabolic geometry, it is sometimes possible to find special metrics characterised by some invariant conditions. In conformal geometry, for example, one asks for an Einstein metric in the conformal class. Einstein metrics have the special property that their geodesics are distinguished, as unparameterised curves, in the sense of parabolic geometry. This property characterises the Einstein metrics. In this article we initiate a study of corresponding phenomena for other parabolic geometries, in particular for the hypersurface CR and contact Legendrean cases.
Complementing the previous paper in the series, this paper classifies $|2|$-graded parabolic geometries, listing their important properties: the group $G_0$, the graded tangent bundle $gr(T)$ and its algebraïc bracket, the relevant cohomology spaces and the standard Tractor bundle $\mc{T}$. Several of these geometries are then explored in more detail, and the paper ends with a case study that that partially solves the equivalence problem for generic six distributions on nine dimensional manifolds.
For smooth manifolds equipped with various geometric structures, we construct complexes that replace the de Rham complex in providing an alternative fine resolution of the sheaf of locally constant functions. In case that the geometric structure is that of a parabolic geometry, our complexes coincide with the Bernstein-Gelfand-Gelfand complex associated with the trivial representation. However, at least in the cases we discuss, our constructions are relatively simple and avoid most of the machinery of parabolic geometry. Moreover, our method extends to certain geometries beyond the parabolic r…
New universal invariant operators are introduced in a class of geometries which include the quaternionic structures and their generalisations as well as 4-dimensional conformal (spin) geometries. It is shown that, in a broad sense, all invariants and invariant operators arise from these universal operators and that they may be used to reduce all invariants problems to corresponding algebraic problems involving homomorphisms between modules of certain parabolic subgroups of Lie groups. Explicit application of the operators is illustrated by the construction of all non-standard operators between…
Using the theory of Weyl structures, we give a natural generalization of the notion of essential conformal structures and conformal Killing fields to arbitrary parabolic geometries. We show that a parabolic structure is inessential whenever the automorphism group acts properly on the base space. As a corollary of the generalized Ferrand-Obata theorem proved by C. Frances, this proves a generalization of the "Lichnerowicz conjecture" for conformal Riemannian, strictly pseudo-convex CR, and quaternionic/octonionic contact manifolds in positive-definite signature. For an infinitesimal automorphis…
We prove a theorem relating the automorphism group of a Cartan geometry to the group on which the geometry is modeled: a component of the adjoint representation of the first embeds in the adjoint representation of the second. Consequences of the theorem include general bounds on the rank and nilpotence degree of an automorphism group; a result asserting local homogeneity and completeness of parabolic geometries admitting a maximal-rank group of automorphisms; and a local freeness theorem for actions additionally preserving a continuous volume form.
BGG-sequences offer a uniform construction for invariant differential operators for a large class of geometric structures called parabolic geometries. For locally flat geometries, the resulting sequences are complexes, but in general the compositions of the operators in such a sequence are nonzero. In this paper, we show that under appropriate torsion freeness and/or semi-flatness assumptions certain parts of all BGG sequences are complexes. Several examples of structures, including quaternionic structures, hypersurface type CR structures and quaternionic contact structures are discussed in de…
We initiate a new study of differential operators with symmetries and combine this with the study of branching laws for Verma modules of reductive Lie algebras. By the criterion for discretely decomposable and multiplicity-free restrictions of generalized Verma modules [T. Kobayashi, http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00031-012-9180-y {Transf. Groups (2012)}], we are brought to natural settings of parabolic geometries for which there exist unique equivariant differential operators to submanifolds. Then we apply a new method (F-method) relying on the Fourier transform to find singular vectors in genera…
We show that a car, viewed as a nonholonomic system, provides an example of a flat parabolic geometry of type $({\bf SO}(2,3),P_{12})$, where $P_{12}$ is a Borel parabolic subgroup in ${\bf SO}(2,3)$. We discuss the relations of this geometry of a car with the geometry of circles in the plane (a low dimensional Lie sphere geometry), the geometry of 3-dimensional conformal Minkowski spacetime, the geometry of 3-rd order ODEs, projective contact geometry in three dimensions, and the corresponding twistor fibrations. We indicate how all these classical geometries can be interpreted in terms of th…
Each sub-Riemannian geometry with bracket generating distribution enjoys a background structure determined by the distribution itself. At the same time, those geometries with constant sub-Riemannian symbols determine a unique Cartan connection leading to their principal invariants. We provide cohomological description of the structure of these curvature invariants in the cases where the background structure is one of the parabolic geometries. As an illustration, constant curvature models are discussed for certain sub-Riemannian geometries.
