Polar actions on Damek-Ricci spaces (Q2034550)

The author studies polar actions on Damek-Ricci spaces. A Damek-Ricci space is a non-compact harmonic Riemannian manifold. An isometric Lie group action on a Riemannian manifold is called polar if there exists a closed connected submanifold which meets all orbits orthogonally. A Damek-Ricci space can be seen as a semi-direct product \(S=A\ltimes N\), where \(A\) is one dimensional and \(N\) is a generalized Heisenberg group. The Lie algebra \(\mathfrak{n}\) of \(N\) decomposes as \(\mathfrak{n}=\mathfrak{v}\oplus \mathfrak{z}\), where \(\mathfrak{v}\) is a vector space and \(\mathfrak{z}\) is the Lie algebra of the center of \(N\). The group \(N\) is equipped with an inner product, and, for \(Z\in \mathfrak{z}\), the endomorphism \(J_Z\) defined by \[\langle J_ZU,V\rangle =\langle [U,V],Z\rangle \quad (U,V\in \mathfrak{v}),\] satisfies \[J_Z^2=-\langle Z,Z\rangle Id_{\mathfrak{v}}.\] The author considers a closed connected subgroup \(\Sigma\) of \(S\) whose Lie algebra decomposes as \(\mathfrak{a}\oplus \mathfrak{v}'\oplus \mathfrak{z}'\), with \(\mathfrak{v}'\subset \mathfrak{v}\), \(\mathfrak{z}'\subset \mathfrak{z}\). Among other results it is shown that \(\Sigma \) is a totally geodesic submanifold of \(S\) if \(J_{\mathfrak{v}'}=\mathfrak{v}'\). Furthermore, if \(\mathfrak{z}'=0\), there exists a closed subgroup \(H\) of \(S\) which acts polarly on \(S\) by left translations such that \(\Sigma \) is a section for the action of \(H\).