Stable ergodicity and frame flows (Q1397921)

eet \(V\) be a smooth \(n\)-dimensional compact oriented manifold with negative sectional curvatures \(K\), satisfying the pinching condition \(-\Lambda^2< K< -\lambda^2\). Let \(M= SV\) be the unit tangent bundle for \(V\) and \(\phi_t: M\to M\) be the geodesic flow. Let \(\widehat M\) be the space of positively oriented orthonormal \(n\)-frames in \(TM\). This gives a fibre bundle, where the projection \(\rho: \widehat M\to M\) takes a frame to its first vector. Let \(\widehat\phi_t:\widehat M\to\widehat M\) denote the frame flow, which acts on frames by moving their first vectors according to the geodesic flow and moving the other vectors by parallel transport along the geodesics defined by the first vector. The frame flow \(\widehat\phi_t\) preserves the natural measure \(\widehat\mu= \mu\times \nu_{\text{SO}(n-1)}\), where \(\nu_{\text{SO}(n-1)}\) is the Haar measure on the structural group \(\text{SO}(n-1)\) of the bundle \(\rho\) and \(\mu\) is the Liouville measure on \(M\). The ergodicity of \(\{\widehat\phi_t\}\) is known for several cases, e.g. by \textit{M. I. Brin} [Math. Notes 18, 858-864 (1975); translation from Mat. Zametki 18, 453-465 (1975; Zbl 0332.58010)] if \(V\) has constant negative curvature. The authors prove that the frame flow is ergodic and has the \(K\) property if \(n= 7\) or \(8\) and \(\lambda/\Lambda> 0.99023\). These results were missing from the results of Brin, Gromov and Karcher. Furthermore, the authors prove that the time-one map of the frame flow \(f=\widehat\phi_1\) is stably ergodic and stably \(K\) in several cases, where stably means sufficiently small \(C^2\)-perturbation likewise.