Finiteness of infinitesimal deformations and infinitesimal rigidity of hypersurfaces in real Euclidean spaces (Q2566521)

In the classical Beez-Killing theorem has proved that if a germ of hypersurfaces in \(\mathbb R^{n+1}\) \((n\geq 3)\), has three nonzero principal curvatures then it is rigid [\textit{M. Spivak}, Comprehensive differential geometry. Vol. 5 (1975; Zbl 0306.53003)]. In this paper the authors study isometric embeddings of Riemannian \(n\)-manifolds into \(\mathbb R^{n+1} (n\geq 3)\) and conformal embeddings of Riemannian \(n\)-manifolds into \(\mathbb R^{n+1} (n\geq 5)\). In each case, embeddings are defined by an overdetermined system of nonlinear partial differential equations of first order. Also it is proved that the linearised system at an embedding admits prolongation to a complete system of finite order under certain generic conditions on the embedding, which implies finite order of the space of infinitesimal deformations. In the case when the dimension of the automorphism group of the target manifold is equal to the dimension of the infinitesimal deformation, it is proved that the embedding is infinitesimally rigid.