Spheres with more than 7 vector fields: All the fault of \(\mathrm{Spin}(9)\) (Q1931724)

It is well known that the group \(\mathrm{Spin}(9)\) can be considered as a subgroup of \(\mathrm{SO}(16)\) acting on \({\mathbb R}^{16}\) or, in other words, acting on \({\mathbb O}^{2}\), where \(\mathbb O\) denotes the octonions. The authors make use of this representation of \(\mathrm{Spin}(9)\) in order to endow \(\mathbb R^{16}\) with eight complex structures. For vector fields on spheres, these complex structures are shown to play a role which is quite similar to the role of complex, quaternionic, and octonionic units acting on \({\mathbb R}^{2}\), \({\mathbb R}^{4}\), and \({\mathbb R}^{8}\), respectively. The paper contains several explicit examples of maximal systems of orthonormal vector fields on certain spheres.