Counting problems for special-orthogonal Anosov representations (Q2656657)

Let \(X\) be a non compact metric space and \(o\) be a point in \(X\) Given a discrete group \(\Delta\) of isometries of \(X\), consider the orbital counting function \[ N_\Delta(o,t):=\#\{ g\in\Delta : d_X(o, go)\le t\} \] where \(t>0\). The orbital counting problem consists on the study of the asymptotic behaviour of \(N_\Delta(o,t)\) as \(t\to\infty\). Fix \(d=p+q\) where \(p\ge 1\) and \(q\ge 2\), and let \(\langle\cdot,\cdot\rangle_{p,q}\) be the bilinear symmetric form on \({\mathbb R}^d\) defined by \[ \langle (x_1,\dots,x_d),(y_1,\dots,y_d)\rangle_{p,q}:= \sum_{i=1}^{p} x_i y_i - \sum_{i=p+1}^{d} x_i y_i. \] We denote by \(G=PSO(p,q)\) the group of projectivized matrices in \(SL(d, {\mathbb R}^d)\) preserving \(\langle\cdot,\cdot\rangle_{p,q}\) and by \(X_G\) the Riemannian symmetric space of \(G\), that is, the space of \(q\)-dimensional subspaces of \({\mathbb R}^d\) on which the form \(\langle\cdot,\cdot\rangle_{p,q}\) is negative definite. Let \(d_{X_G}\) be the distance in \(X_G\) induced by a \(G\)-invariant Riemannian metric. On the other hand, the pseudo-Riemannian hyperbolic space of signature \((p,q-1)\) is the set \[ {\mathbb H}^{p, q-1}:=\{ o=[\hat o] \in {\mathbb P}({\mathbb R}^d) : \langle\hat o,\hat o\rangle_{p,q}< 0\}, \] endowed with a \(G\)-invariant pseudo-Riemannian metric coming from restriction of the form \(\langle\cdot,\cdot\rangle_{p,q}\) to tangent spaces. Let \(\Delta\) be a discrete subgroup of \(G\) and fix a point \(o\) in \({\mathbb H}^{p, q-1}\). In this paper the author studies counting problems in \(X_G\) and in \({\mathbb H}^{p, q-1}\). Let \(S\subset X_G\) be a totally geodesic copy of \(X_{\mathrm{PSO}(p,q-1)}\). The author looks at the orbit of \(S\) under the action of a projective Anosov subgroup of \(G\). For certain choices of such a geodesic copy he shows that the number of points in this orbit which are at distance at most \(t\) from \(S\) is finite and asymptotic to a purely exponential function as \(t\) goes to infinity. He provides an interpretation of this result in \({\mathbb H}^{p, q-1}\), as the asymptotics of the amount of space-like geodesic segments of maximum length \(t\) in the orbit of a point.