Laplacian flow of closed \(G_2\)-structures inducing nilsolitons (Q2631013)

A \(G_2\)-structure on a 7-dimensional manifold \(M\) is characterized by the existence of a globally defined 3-form. The authors show here the existence of left-invariant closed \(G_2\)-structures defining a Ricci soliton metric on simply connected non-abelian nilpotent Lie groups. They prove long-time existence of the solution for the Laplacian flow on the four nilpotent Lie groups admitting an invariant closed \(G_2\)-structure which determines the nilsoliton. Moreover, considering the Laplacian flow on the associated Lie algebra as a bracket flow on \(\mathbb{R}^7\), in a similar way as in [\textit{J. Lauret}, Commun. Anal. Geom. 19, No. 5, 831--854 (2011; Zbl 1244.53077)], it is proved that the underlying metrics \(g(t)\) of the solution converge smoothly, up to pull-back by time-dependent diffeomorphisms, to a flat metric, uniformly on compact sets in the nilpotent Lie group, as \(t\) goes to infinity.