Local rigidity for Anosov automorphisms. With an appendix by Rafael de la Llave (Q2428819)

It is well known that Anosov diffeomorphisms are structurally stable. That is, given any Anosov diffeomorphism \(f:M\to M\), each \(C^1\) small perturbation \(g\) is topologically conjugate to \(f\) by some homeomorphism \(h:M\to M\). Such a conjugacy is always Hölder continuous, but it may fail to be differentiable. A necessary condition for \(h\) to be a diffeomorphism is the following ``period condition'': For each \(x=g^n x\), \(D_xg^n\) and \(D_{h(x)}f^n\) are conjugate, i.e., \[ D_xg^n=(D_{x}h)^{-1}\circ D_{h(x)}f^n\circ D_{x}h. \] In particular, the map \(f\) is said to be locally rigid, if for any small perturbation \(g\) satisfying the period condition, the conjugacy \(H\) is a diffeomorphism. It turns out that the period condition is sufficient in the 2D case [\textit{R. de la Llave}, Commun. Math. Phys. 109, 369--378 (1987; Zbl 0673.58036); Commun. Math. Phys. 150, No. 2, 289--320 (1992; Zbl 0770.58029); \textit{R. de la Llave} and \textit{R. Moriyón}, Commun. Math. Phys. 116, No. 2, 185--192 (1988; Zbl 0673.58038)], but not enough in the higher-dimensional cases [\textit{R. de la Llave}, Zbl 0770.58029 and Ergodic Theory Dyn. Syst. 22, No. 6, 1845--1870 (2002; Zbl 1028.37021)]. Conjecture: Local rigidity holds for irreducible hyperbolic toral automorphisms. Local rigidity has been proved for several new classes by the authors of this paper. In this paper, they improve their results, and show local rigidity for all irreducible Anosov automorphisms on \(\mathbb{T}^n\) with no three eigenvalues of the same modulus. The intermediate foliations play an important role in their study, where smoothness is first proved along these foliations. Then they apply Journé's regularity Lemma to get the smoothness on the whole torus. They also prove that the hyperbolic automorphisms, which do not fulfill their conditions, are rare. Therefore local rigidity holds for the majority of hyperbolic toral automorphisms. A few examples are given in the appendix.