Automorphisms of 2-nondegenerate hypersurfaces in \(\mathbb{C}^3\) (Q5951099)

\textit{P. Ebenfelt} [Indiana Univ. Math. J. 47, 311-366 (1998; Zbl 0941.32033)] has computed eight types of partial normal forms for real analytic hypersurfaces which are Levi degenerate and \(2\)-nondegenerate at the origin in \({\mathbb C}^3\). All are represented by an osculating cubic. For five of these, the cubic is homogeneous and the Levi form is identically zero at \(0\). For the other three, the cubic is not homogeneous and the Levi form at \(0\) has eigenvalues \(0\) and \(1\). Among these three, only one type (B2 in the paper), which is given by \(\text{Im} w= |z_1 |^2+ z_1^2\overline z_2+ \overline z_1^2 z_2+ \text{O}(|z|^4+ |\text{Re} w||z|^2)\) may be uniformly Levi degenerate of rank one in a neighborhood of \(0\) in \(M\). In the paper under review, the author computes the infinitesimal CR automorphisms of the eight osculating cubics. As is known such computations are automatic, but heavy and difficult to handle. When the cubic is homogeneous, the computations are greatly simplified thanks to a weight argument. In case B2, the author shows that the cubic \(\text{Im} w= |z_1 |^2+ z_1^2\overline z_2+ \overline z_1^2 z_2\) has a six-dimensional CR automorphism group, infinitesimally generated by \[ 2\text{Re} \{[\alpha+ \beta w+ 2i\overline \mu z_1^2] \partial_w+ \tau z_1 \partial_{z_1} + [\mu+ (\beta-2 \overline\tau) z_2+ iqz_1^2] \partial_{z_2}\}, \] where \(\alpha,\beta, q\in {\mathbb R}\), \(\mu,\tau\in {\in\mathbb C}\) and \(\text{Re} \tau=\beta/2\). In the second part of the paper, the author shows that in each of the eight cases, after taking into account the remainder terms, the dimension of the CR automorphism group can only decrease. By lack of space, full details of these even more delicate computations are not provided. In fact, the reviewer believes that this estimate is true for the first five classes, having homogeneous osculating cubic. However, case B2 is more subtle. The cubic \(\text{Im} w= |z_1 |^2+ z_1^2\overline z_2+ \overline z_1^2 z_2\) is Levi nondegenerate at each point \((z_{1p},z_{2p},w_p)\) with \(z_{2p}\neq 0\). On the contrary, the hypersurface of equation \(\text{Im} w={|z_1|^2+ z_1^2\overline z_2+\overline z_1^2 z_2\over 1-|z_2|^2}\) is uniformly Levi degenerate at every point. Also, it is not biholomorphically equivalent to the light cone. Direct computation in the spirit of the article under review shows that its infinitesimal CR automorphism group is transitive, of dimension seven, with two-dimensional isotropy at every point. Thus, Levi degeneracy at all nearby points imposes more symmetries than the osculating cubic. \textit{P. Ebenfelt} [Duke Math. J. 110, No. 1, 37-80 (2001; Zbl 1020.32029)] shows that the dimension of the isotropy group of a point of a general uniformly levi degenerate hypersurface of rank one in \({\mathbb C}^3\) is less than or equal to \(2\).