This is a review with examples concerning the concepts of affine (in particular, constant and linear) vector fields and fundamental vector fields on a manifold. The affine, linear and constant vector fields on a manifold are shown to be in a bijective correspondence with the fundamental vector fields on it of respectively general affine, general linear and translation groups (locally) represented on the manifold via the described in this work left actions; in a case of the manifolds R^n and C^n, the actions mentioned have the usual meaning of affine, linear and translation transformations.
A linear connection is associated to a nonlinear connection on a vector bundle by a linearization procedure. Our definition is intrinsic in terms of vector fields on the bundle. For a connection on an affine bundle our procedure can be applied after homogenization and restriction. Several applications in Classical Mechanics are provided.
We give characterizations of affine transformations and affine vector fields in terms of the spray. By utilizing the Jacobi type equation that characterizes affine vector fields, we prove some rigidity theorems of affine vector fields on compact or forward complete non-compact Finsler manifolds with non-positive total Ricci curvature.
A study of proper affine vector fields in plane symmetric static space-times by using the rank of the Rieman matrix and holonomy. Studying proper affine vector fields in each case, It is shown that the special class of the above space-times admit proper affine vector fields.
A theory of double affine and special double affine bundles, i.e. differential manifolds with two compatible (special) affine bundle structures, is developed as an affine counterpart of the theory of double vector bundles. The motivation and basic examples come from Analytical Mechanics, where double affine bundles have been recognized as a proper geometrical tool in a frame-independent description of many important systems. Different approaches to the (special) double affine bundles are compared and carefully studied together with the problems of double vector bundle models and hulls, duality…
The homogeneous affine surfaces have been classified by Opozda. They may be grouped into 3 families, which are not disjoint. The connections which arise as the Levi-Civita connection of a surface with a metric of constant Gauss curvature form one family; there are, however, two other families. For a surface in one of these other two families, we examine the Lie algebra of affine Killing vector fields and we give a complete classification of the homogeneous affine gradient Ricci solitons. The rank of the Ricci tensor plays a central role in our analysis.
We prove that a bounded affine vector field on a complete Finsler manifold is a Killing vector field. This generalizes the analogous result of Hano for Riemannian manifolds. Even though our result is more general, the proof is significantly simpler.
We generalize the notion of a Lie algebroid over infinite jet bundle by replacing the variational anchor with an N-tuple of differential operators whose images in the Lie algebra of evolutionary vector fields of the jet space are subject to collective commutation closure. The linear space of such operators becomes an algebra with bi-differential structural constants, of which we study the canonical structure. In particular, we show that these constants incorporate bi-differential analogues of Christoffel symbols.
The classical Fundamental Theorem of Affine Geometry states that for $n\geq 2$, any bijection of $n$-dimensional Euclidean space that maps lines to lines (as sets) is given by an affine map. We consider an analogous characterization of affine automorphisms for compact quotients, and establish it for tori: A bijection of an n-dimensional torus ($n\geq 2$) is affine if and only if it maps lines to lines.
Many extensions of General Relativity are based on considering metric and affine structures as independent properties of spacetime. This leads to the possibility of introducing torsion as an independent degree of freedom. In this article we examine the effects of torsion on the affine Killing vectors of two-dimensional manifolds. We give a complete description of the Lie algebras of affine Killing vector fields on homogeneous surfaces. This can be used in the search of non-metrizable surfaces of interest.
We describe the compact Lorentzian $3$-manifolds admitting a parallel lightlike vector field. The classification of compact Lorentzian $3$-manifolds admitting non-isometric affine diffeomorphisms follows, together with the complete description of these morphisms. Such a Lorentzian manifold is in some sense an equivariant deformation of a flat one.
We show that the category of affine bundles over a smooth manifold M is equivalent to the category of affine spaces modelled on projective finitely generated C^\infty(M)-modules. Using this equivalence of categories, we are able to give an alternate proof of the main result of [13], showing that the characterization of vector bundles by means of their Lie algebras of homogeneous differential operators also holds for vector bundles of rank 1 and over any base manifolds.
Affine structures on a Lie groupoid, including affine $k$-vector fields, $k$-forms and $(p,q)$-tensors are studied. We show that the space of affine structures is a 2-vector space over the space of multiplicative structures. Moreover, the space of affine multivector fields has a natural graded strict Lie 2-algebra structure and affine (1,1)-tensors constitute a strict monoidal category. Such higher structures can be seen as the categorification of multiplicative structures on a Lie groupoid.
Let $\widetilde{J}$ be the canonical para-complex structure on $\mathbb{R}^4$. In this paper we study $3$-dimensional centro-affine hypersurfaces with a $\widetilde{J}$-tangent centro-affine vector field (sometimes called $\widetilde{J}$-tangent centro-affine hypersurfaces) as well as $3$-dimensional $\widetilde{J}$-tangent affine hyperspheres with the property that at least one null-direction of the second fundamental form coincides with either $\mathcal{D}^+$ or $\mathcal{D}^-$. The main purpose of this paper is to give a full local classification of the above mentioned hypersurfaces. In par…
A Margulis spacetime is a complete flat affine Lorentzian 3-manifold with free fundamental group. Associated to $M$ is a noncompact complete hyperbolic surface $Σ$. We study double extensions of $π_1 (M) \cong π_1 (Σ)$ when $Σ$ is homeomorphic to a projective plane minus two discs. We classify proper actions of this double extension on Minkowski space and show that there exist proper actions that do not admit crooked fundamental domains.
We develop a theory of stable bundles and affine Hermitian-Einstein metrics for flat vector bundles over a special affine manifold (a manifold admitting an atlas whose gluing maps are all locally constant volume-preserving affine maps). Our paper presents a parallel to Donaldson-Uhlenbeck-Yau's proof of the existence of Hermitian-Einstein metrics on Kähler manifolds, and the extension of this theorem by Li-Yau to the non-Kähler complex case of Gauduchon metrics. Our definition of stability involves only flat vector subbundles (and not singular subsheaves), and so is simpler than the complex ca…
Associated to every complete affine 3-manifold M with nonsolvable fundamental group is a noncompact hyperbolic surface S. We classify such complete affine structures when Sigma is homeomorphic to a three-holed sphere. In particular, for every such complete hyperbolic surface Sigma, the deformation space identifies with two opposite octants in R^3. Furthermore every M admits a fundamental polyhedron bounded by crooked planes. Therefore M is homeomorphic to an open solid handlebody of genus two. As an explicit application of this theory, we construct proper affine deformations of an arithmetic F…
The aim of this paper is to prove that a control affine system on a manifold is equivalent by diffeomorphism to a linear system on a Lie group or a homogeneous space if and only the vector fields of the system are complete and generate a finite dimensional Lie algebra. A vector field on a connected Lie group is linear if its flow is a one parameter group of automorphisms. An affine vector field is obtained by adding a left invariant one. Its projection on a homogeneous space, whenever it exists, is still called affine. Affine vector fields on homogeneous spaces can be characterized by their Li…
We study affine Jacobi structures on an affine bundle $π:A\to M$, i.e. Jacobi brackets that close on affine functions. We prove that there is a one-to-one correspondence between affine Jacobi structures on $A$ and Lie algebroid structures on the vector bundle $A^+=\bigcup_{p\in M}Aff(A_p,\R)$ of affine functionals. Some examples and applications, also for the linear case, are discussed. For a special type of affine Jacobi structures which are canonically exhibited (strongly-affine or affine-homogeneous Jacobi structures) over a real vector space of finite dimension, we describe the leaves of i…
An affine manifold is said to be geodesically complete if all affine geodesics extend for all time. It is said to be affine Killing complete if the integral curves for any affine Killing vector field extend for all time. We use the solution space of the quasi-Einstein equation to examine these concepts in the setting of homogeneous affine surfaces.
Our aim here is to investigate the holomorphic geometric structures on compact complex manifolds which may not be Kähler. We prove that holomorphic geometric structures of affine type on compact Calabi-Yau manifolds with polystable tangent bundle (with respect to some Gauduchon metric on it) are locally homogeneous. In particular, if the geometric structure is rigid in Gromov's sense, then the fundamental group of the manifold must be infinite. We also prove that compact complex manifolds of algebraic dimension one bearing a holomorphic Riemannian metric must have infinite fundamental group.
A curvature model (V,A) is a real vector space V which is equipped with a "curvature operator" A(x,y)z that A has the same symmetries as an affine curvature operator; A(x,y)z=-A(y,x)z and A(x,y)z+A(y,z)x+A(z,x)y=0. Such a model is called projective affine Osserman if the spectrum of the Jacobi operator J(y):x->A(x,y)y, is projectively constant. There are topological conditions imposed on such a model by Adam's Theorem concerning vector fields on spheres. In this paper we construct projective affine Osserman curvature models when the dimension is odd, when the dimension is congruent to 2 mod 4,…
Let $\widetilde{J}$ be the canonical para-complex structure on $\mathbb{R}^{2n+2}\simeq\widetilde{\mathbb{C}}^{n+1}$. We study real affine hypersurfaces $f\colon M\rightarrow \widetilde{\mathbb{C}}^{n+1}$ with a $\widetilde{J}$-tangent transversal vector field. Such vector field induces in a natural way an almost paracontact structure ${(φ,ξ,η)}$ on $M$ as well as the affine connection $\nabla$. In this paper we give the classification of hypersurfaces with the property that $φ$ or $η$ is parallel relative to the connection $\nabla$. Moreover, we show that if $\nablaφ=0$ (respectively $\nablaη…
We determine explicitly the foliated cohomology $H_{\cal F}^\ast (M)$ of the affine Reeb flow ${\cal F}$ on the Hopf manifold ${\Bbb S}^n\times {\Bbb S}^1$. The vector space $H_{\cal F}^1(M)$ contains exactly the obstructions to solve the cohomological equation $X\cdot f=g$ where $f$ and $g$ are $C^\infty $-functions and $X$ is any non singular vector field defining the foliation ${\cal F}$. The topological dual of $H_{\cal F}^1(M)$ is the space of distributions invariant by $X$.