The Cayley cubic and differential equations (Q2048295)

Cayley's ruled cubic is a projective surface in \(\mathbb{P}^3\), satisfying the equation \[ \frac{1}{3}{(y^2)}^3+y^0y^3y^3-y^1y^2y^3=0, \] where \([y^0 : y^1 : y^2 : y^3]\) are homogeneous coordinates for \(\mathbb{P}^3\). The remarkable properties of this surface are recalled in the paper under review, where Cayley structures are defined as a field of Cayley's ruled cubic surfaces over a four-dimensional manifold. The aim of the paper is to find the analogy between Cayley structures and indefinite conformal structures as well as the relation (via an extension of the twistor theory) between the theory of integrable systems and a class of 4-dimensional causal structures. A causal structure can be seen as the field of light cones arising from the conformal class of a pseudo-Finsler metric. More exactly, the causal structures are defined as Cayley structures for which the light cone in each tangent space is the cone over the projective surface called Cayley's ruled cubic. Some notions from the theory of indefinite conformal structures in dimension four, such as: half-flatness, existence of a null foliation, ultra-half-flatness, an associated pair of second order ODEs, and a dispersionless Lax pair, are extended for Cayley structures. The authors characterize invariantly the path geometries induced on the 3-dimensional twistor space of half-flat Cayley structures and show that there is a one-to-one correspondence between half-flat Cayley structures and point equivalence classes of pairs of second-order ODEs with torsion of rank one and constant up to Mobius transformations. Thus, the study is motivated by the fact that, after conformal geometry, half-flat Cayley structures can be thought of as the second-simplest class of causal structures, arising from a pair of second-order ODEs. A 2-dimensional path geometry is introduced in terms of a triple \((S, \ell_1, \ell_2)\). The natural path geometry is induced by the characteristic curves on each leaf of the 3-parameter family of null surfaces in a half-flat Cayley structure. The authors prove that such path geometries are flat, extending a fact known for indefinite half-flat conformal structures from [\textit{F. A. Belgun}, Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 356, No. 3, 853--880 (2004; Zbl 1045.53025); \textit{C. Lebrun} and \textit{L. J. Mason}, Duke Math. J. 136, No. 2, 205--273 (2007; Zbl 1113.53032)]. On half-flat Cayley structures with an additional foliation by null surfaces, the authors show that the path geometry \((S_{\mathrm{null}}, \ell_1, \ell_2)\) induced by the characteristic curves on each leaf of the foliation, defines a projective structure which depends on one function of two variables. Finally, the authors get an invariant condition which implies the existence of a path geometry on the 2-dimensional leaf space of the null foliation \((S_{\mathrm{uhf}}, \ell_1, \ell_2)\). Such class of half-flat Cayley structures, called ultra-half-flat, is the analogue of a class of indefinite half-flat conformal structures studied, e.g., in [\textit{D. M. J. Calderbank}, SIGMA, Symmetry Integrability Geom. Methods Appl. 10, Paper 035, 18 p. (2014; Zbl 1288.53075); \textit{M. Dunajski} and \textit{S. West}, Commun. Math. Phys. 272, No. 1, 85--118 (2007; Zbl 1147.53022)]. The authors prove that under a supplementary condition, a half-flat Cayley structure is ultra-half-flat and depends locally on three functions of three variables. Moreover, such a structure for which the path geometries \((S_{\mathrm{null}}, \ell_1, \ell_2)\) and \((S_{\mathrm{uhf}}, \ell_1, \ell_2)\) are both projectively flat depends on eight functions of two variables. Next, several examples of half-flat Cayley structures are considered and certain Cayley structures are expressed in terms of a coframe or their corresponding pair of ODEs on their twistor space. All submaximal models are found and introduced explicitly. Having in mind the results from [\textit{M. Dunajski} et al., J. Math. Phys. 56, No. 8, 083501, 10 p. (2015; Zbl 1325.53058)] for conformal structures and [\textit{W. Kryński} and \textit{T. Mettler}, Commun. Anal. Geom. 27, No. 8, 1851--1868 (2019; Zbl 1464.53029)] for GL\(_2(\mathbb{R})\)-structures, in the last section of the paper the authors study the half-flatness condition for Cayley structures. They prove the one-to-one correspondence between half-flat Cayley structures and solutions to a system of seven PDEs for three unknown functions of four variables. They also show that the system possesses a dispersionless Lax pair and that the characteristic variety for the linearization of the Lax system along a solution is the ruled Cayley cubic in the cotangent bundle of each point. Its dual variety gives a ruled Cayley cubic in each tangent space, which can be used to define a Cayley structure on the four-manifold corresponding to the given solution of the system of PDEs. At the end of the paper, the Lax pair are used for giving another way of seeing the 2D path geometries presented in a previous section.