Almost quaternion-Hermitian manifolds (Q1876575)

A \(4n\)-dimensional manifold (\(n > 1\)) is called almost quaternion-Hermitian if its frame bundle admits a reduction to \(Sp (n) Sp(1)\). Associated to this type of geometry is a global non-degenerate \(4\)-form given locally by \[ \Omega = \omega_I \wedge \omega_I + \omega_J \wedge \omega_J + \omega_K \wedge \omega_K, \] where \(\omega_I, \omega_J, \omega_K\) are the three local Kähler forms. The covariant derivative \(\nabla \Omega\) (\(\nabla\): the Levi-Civita connection) belongs to the space \({\mathcal W} = T^* M \otimes (sp (n) \oplus sp(1))^{\perp}\), where \((sp (n) \oplus sp(1))^{\perp}\) denotes the orthogonal complement of \(sp (n) \oplus sp(1)\) in the Lie algebra \(so (4n)\). In [C. R. Acad. Sci. Paris 308, 225--228 (1989; Zbl 0661.53023)] \textit{A. Swann} found a decomposition of the \(Sp (n) Sp(1)\)-module \(\mathcal W\) in four (resp. six) irreducible components for \(n = 2\) (resp. \(n>2)\), and he proved that \(\nabla \Omega\) is determined by the exterior derivative \(d \Omega\). Therefore there are at most 16 (resp. 64) classes of almost quaternion-Hermitian manifolds. In the present paper the author finds conditions which define each of the above classes. He shows that if \(n > 2\) then the intrinsic torsion \(\nabla \Omega\) is totally determined by \(d \Omega\). In this way he obtains a characterization of the classes in terms of \(d \Omega\). In 8 dimensions the exterior derivative \(d \Omega\) gives only partial information on \(\nabla \Omega\), so in this case the author obtains a characterization of eight of the sixteen possible classes.