Homogeneous submanifolds of codimension two (Q1817953)

Let \(f:M^n\to \mathbb{R}^{n+2}\) be an isometric immersion of a Riemannian homogeneous manifold. Let \(v_f(x)\) denote the relative nullity of \(f\) and \(\overline v=\min_{\alpha\in M}v_f(x)\leq n-5\). It is shown that then either \(f\) is rigid or for each \(x\in M\) there exist orthonormal vectors \(\xi, \eta\in T^\perp_xM\) such that rank \(A_\eta\leq 2\) and \(A_\xi\) is constant. If rank \(A_\eta\leq 1\), then \(M\) is either isometric to \(S^m\times \mathbb{R}^{n-m}\) or covered by the Riemannian product \(S^{n-1}\times\mathbb{R}\) and \(f\) is the corresponding composition. If rank \(A_\eta=2\), then (a) if \(n\geq 4\) and the second fundamental form \(h\) is definite at some point, then \(M=S^2\times S^{n-2}\) and \(f\) is a product of hypersurface immersions; (b) if \(h\) is not definite at any point, then \(f\) is equivariant. These results are applied to study the compact cohomogeneity one hypersurfaces, i.e., isometric immersions \(f:M^n \to\mathbb{R}^{n+1}\), \(n\geq 5\), of Riemannian \(G\)-manifolds \(M^n\) whose principal \(G\)-orbits are of codimension one. It is shown that if these orbits have positive sectional curvature, then \(f(M^n)\) is hypersurface of revolution.