Harmonic \(\text{Sp}(2)\)-invariant \(\text{G}_2\)-structures on the 7-sphere (Q2157488)

Consider the sphere \(\mathbb{S}^7\) as a homogeneous space \(\mathbb{S}^7 = \mathrm{Sp}(2)/\mathrm{Sp}(1)\) under the natural action of the \(2\times 2\) quaternionic unitary group, \(\mathrm{Sp}(2)\). The paper contains a detailed and comprehensive study of the class of \(\mathrm{Sp}(2)\)-invariant \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structures on the sphere (denoted \(\Omega_+^3(\mathbb{S}^7)^{\mathrm{Sp}(2)}\)) as well as the space of \(\mathrm{Sp}(2)\)-invariant Riemannian metrics, \(\operatorname{Sym}^2_+(T^\ast \mathbb{S}^7)^{\mathrm{Sp}(2)}\). Theorem 1 is an explicit identification of \(\Omega^3_+(\mathbb{S}^7)^{\mathrm{Sp}(2)}\) with \(\mathbb{R}^+\times \operatorname{Gl}^+(3,\mathbb{R})\), together with a corresponding identification of \(\operatorname{Sym}^2_+(T^\ast \mathbb{S}^7)^{\mathrm{Sp}(2)}\) with \(\mathbb{R}^+\times (\operatorname{Gl}^+(3,\mathbb{R})/\mathrm{SO}(3))\). With respect to the identification in Theorem 1, Theorem 2 concerns \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structures identified with the subset \(\{r\}\times \mathrm{SO}(3)\) of \(\mathbb{R}^+\times \operatorname{Gl}^+(3,\mathbb{R})\). Within this family, the authors characterize the coclosed \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structures, the nearly parallel \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structures, and the locally conformally closed \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structures. Theorem 3 identifies the harmonic \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structures within each \(\{r\}\times \mathrm{SO}(3)\) class. Theorems 4 and 5 are concerned with the energy functional and a reduced version of the energy functional on the \(\{r\}\times \mathrm{SO}(3)\) class. Specifically, Theorem 4 is a classification of the critical points, and their indices and nullities, with respect to homogeneous deformations. Theorem 5 gives bounds on the indices under the assumption of general deformations. In addition, the authors obtain results for homogeneous \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structures which are \textit{not} of the form \(\{r\}\times \mathrm{SO}(3)\). In particular, they find new examples of harmonic \(\mathrm{Ad}(\mathrm{Sp}(1))\)-invariant \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structures. Theorem 1 is proved as follows. First, the \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structures are homogeneous, so can be identified with \(\mathrm{Ad}(\mathrm{Sp}(1))\)-invariant elements of \(\Lambda^3 \mathfrak{p}^\ast\) with \(\mathfrak{p}\) a certain subspace of the Lie algebra of \(\mathrm{Sp}(2)\). The authors explicitly identify these elements through a representation-theoretic computation. Once the elements are specified, the identification in Theorem 1 is natural. In order to prove Theorem 2, the authors first explicitly compute the full torsion tensor of a general homogeneous \(\mathbf{G}_2\)-structure on \(\mathbb{S}^7\). This is then specialized to the case of \(\{r\}\times \mathrm{SO}(3)\), where the formulas simplify considerably. Theorems 3 and 4 follow via explicit computations paired with the Palais Principle of Symmetric Criticality, see [\textit{R. S. Palais}, Commun. Math. Phys. 69, 19--30 (1979; Zbl 0417.58007)]. Theorem 5 is an immediate consequence of Theorem 4.