Three-dimensional minimal CR submanifolds in \(S^{6}\) satisfying Chen's equality (Q2507874)

A submanifold \(M\) of the nearly Kähler 6-sphere \(S^6\) is called a CR-submanifold if \(M\) admits a differentiable holomorphic distribution \({\mathcal H}\), such that its orthogonal complement \({\mathcal H}^\perp\in{\mathcal {TM}}\) is totally real. Totally real submanifolds \(({\mathcal H}^\perp={\mathcal {TM}}\)) and holomorphic submanifolds \(({\mathcal H}={\mathcal{TM}})\) are trivial examples. A CR-submanifold is called proper if it is neither totally real nor holomorphic. Let \(M\) be a Riemannian \(n\)-manifold, \(p\) a point of \(M\) and denote by \(K(\pi)\) the sectional curvature of a plane section \(\pi\subset T_pM\). The function \[ \delta_M(p)=\tau (p)-\text{inf}\bigl\{K(\pi):\pi\text{ plane plane section of }T_pM\bigr\}, \] where \(\tau\) is the scalar curvature of \(M\), is a Riemannian invariant. A general inequality, known as Chen's basic inequality, holds for \(\delta_M\) when \(M\) is a submanifold of a space of constant sectional curvature (cfr. [\textit{B. Y. Chen}, Arch. Math. 60, No. 6, 568--578 (1993; Zbl 0811.53060)]). In the equality case, such a manifold admits a canonical distribution \({\mathcal D}(p)\), which is completely integrable when it has constant dimension. For a minimal submanifold of \(S^6(1)\), Chen's basic inequality reduces to \(\delta_M< 2\). The authors study three-dimensional minimal CR-submanifolds of \(S^6(1)\), satisfying Chen's equality \(\delta_M=2\). They completely classify these manifolds, showing that either they are totally real (and so, they are included in the classification given in [\textit{F. Dillen} and \textit{L. Vrancken}, Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 348, No. 4, 1633--1646 (1996)]), or they are locally isometric to a special immersion into \(S^6(1)\), which is explicitly described. The paper is clearly written and well motivated.