Expansive Lie group actions (Q6078366): Difference between revisions

The paper defines and investigates expansive actions of Lie groups on compact Hausdorff spaces, especially closed smooth manifolds. Classically, a homeomorphism \(f:X\to X\) of a compact metric space \(X\) is \textit{expansive} if there is a constant \(\delta>0\) such that for every \(x\neq y\in X\) there is \(n\in\mathbb{Z}\) so that \(d(f^n(x),f^n(y))>\delta\). A straightforward generalization of the definition is also available for actions of more general discrete groups. An easy argument shows that this definition does not work for flows, i.e., actions of \(\mathbb{R}\). For this reason \textit{R. Bowen} and \textit{P. Walters} [J. Differ. Equations 12, 180--193 (1972; Zbl 0242.54041)] introduced another definition for flows, called in the article under review \textit{BW-expansiveness}, which is here generalized to actions of connected Lie groups as follows. An action of a connected Lie group \(G\) on a compact metric space \(M\) is expansive if for every \(\varepsilon>0\) there is \(\delta>0\) so that if \(x,y\in M\) are such that \(d(gx,f(g)y)<\delta\), for every \(g\in G\), where \(f:G\to G\) is some continuous function fixing \(1_G\), then there is \(g_0\in G\) with \(|g_0|< \varepsilon\) such that \(y=g_0x\), where \(|g_0|\) is the distance of \(g_0\) from \(1_G\) in some fixed right-invariant metric on \(G\). The article continues with a detailed investigation of this notion. We describe some of the main results below. (1) It was proved in [\textit{L. He} and \textit{G. Shan}, Chin. Ann. Math., Ser. B 12, No. 2, 213--218 (1991; Zbl 0739.58048)] that there are no expansive flows on compact \(2\)-manifolds. The paper generalizes this in the following way. No locally free (i.e., stabilizers of points are discrete subgroups) \(C^2\) action of a connected nilpotent Lie group \(G\) on a closed Riemannian manifold \(M\) with \(\mathrm{dim}(M)-\mathrm{dim}(G)=1\) can be expansive. (2) The paper defines a pseudogroup \(\mathcal{G}\) of local homeomorphisms on a compact metric space \(M\) to be \textit{\(CW\)-expansive} if there is \(\delta>0\) such that for every non-empty closed connected \(C\subseteq M\) there is \(g\in\mathcal{G}\) whose domain contains \(C\) such that \(\mathrm{diam}(g(C))>\delta\). It is then proved that under the assumption of \(CW\)-expansiveness and finite generation of \(\mathcal{G}\) and if \(M\) is infinite and locally connected, the geometric entropy of \(\mathcal{G}\) is positive. (3) By connecting expansive actions of connected Lie groups on closed smooth manifolds with the holonomy pseudogroups of the corresponding orbit foliations it is derived as a corollary that every locally free \(C^1\) expansive action of a connected Lie group \(G\) on a closed smooth manifold \(M\) such that \(\mathrm{dim}(M)-\mathrm{dim}(G)>0\) has a positive geometric entropy. The paper is concluded with several results on centralizers of expansive actions of Abelian Lie groups and finitely generated groups.