The standard CR structure on the unit tangent bundle (Q1802553)

Let \(M\) be a contact manifold with contact form \(\eta\), contact subbundle \(P\) and characteristic vector field \(\xi\). A Riemannian metric \(g\) is called an associated metric if there exists a linear transformation field \(\phi\) such that \(\phi^ 2=-I+\eta\otimes\xi\), \(\eta(X)=g(X,\xi)\) and \(d\eta(X,Y)=g(X,\phi Y)\) and we refer to the contact metric structure \((\eta,g)\). The pair \((\eta,\hat\phi)\) where \(\hat\phi\) is the restriction of \(\phi\) on \(P\) is called the \(CR\)-structure associated to \((\eta,g)\). A contact metric structure \((\eta,g)\) is a strongly pseudo- convex integrable \(CR\)-structure, if it satisfies the integrability condition \(Q=0\), where \(Q\) is the \((1,2)\)-tensor field defined by \[ Q(X,Y)=(\nabla_ Y\phi)(X)+(\nabla_ Y\eta)(\phi X)\xi+\eta(X)\phi\nabla_ Y\xi. \] By a gauge transformation of a contact structure we mean a change of the form \(\tilde\eta=\sigma\eta\) for a positive function \(\sigma\). Let \(\zeta=(1/2\sigma)\phi \text{grad }\sigma\) and \(w\) the dual of \(\zeta\) with respect to \(g\). Then \((\tilde\eta,\tilde g)\) is a gauge transformation of \((\eta,g)\) if \[ \tilde g=\sigma g - \sigma(\eta \otimes w+w \otimes \eta)+\sigma(\sigma - 1+\|\zeta\|^ 2)\eta \otimes \eta. \] In [Hokkaido Math. J. 20, No. 2, 195-204 (1991; Zbl 0727.53039)] the author introduced a gauge invariant \(B\) of type (1,3) as a generalization of the Chern-Moser-Tanaka invariant of \(CR\)-structures. If \(B=0\), then \(Q=0\); if \(Q=0\), then \(B\) reduces to the Chern-Moser-Tanaka invariant. An important and classical class of contact metric manifolds is the class of unit tangent bundles of Riemannian manifolds. Let \((M,g)\) be a Riemannian manifold of dimension at least 3 and \((T^ 1M,\eta,g^*)\) its unit tangent bundle with its standard contact metric structure \((\eta,g^*)\). The main result of the present paper is that the gauge invariant \(B\) of \((T^ 1M,\eta,g^*)\) vanishes if and only if \((M,g)\) has constant curvature \(-1\).