Twisted Dirac operators and generalized gradients (Q329117)

Let \((M,g)\) be an \(n\)-dimensional oriented or spin Riemannian manifold. Let \((\pi_\rho,V_\rho)\) be an \(\text{SO}(n)\) or \(\text{Spin}(n)\) irreducible unitary representation with the highest weight \(\rho\) and let \({\mathbf S}_\rho\) be the associated Hermitian vector bundle. For two such bundles a generalised gradient is the composition of the Levi-Civita connection of \(g\), the Riemannian identification \(T^*M\simeq TM\), and the projection \({\mathbf S}_\rho\otimes TM=\bigoplus_\lambda{\mathbf S}_\lambda\to{\mathbf S}_\lambda\): \[ D_\lambda^\rho:\Gamma(M,{\mathbf S}_\rho)\buildrel{\nabla}\over{\longrightarrow} \Gamma(M,{\mathbf S}_\rho\otimes TM)\buildrel{\Pi_\lambda^\rho}\over{\longrightarrow} \Gamma(M,{\mathbf S}_\lambda). \] Many geometric first-order differential operators are realized as generalized gradients. In particular, such are the Dirac operator, the twistor operator, and the Rarita-Schwinger operator. A generalized Weitzenböck formula is a relation of the following kind \[ \sum_\lambda c_\lambda D_\mu^\lambda D_\lambda^\rho= \text{ a curvature homomorphism from }{\mathbf S}_\rho\text{ to }{\mathbf S}_\mu. \] A non-trivial equation of this kind implies that \(\text{Hom}_{\text{SO(n)}}(\Lambda^2\mathbb{R}^n\otimes{\mathbf S}_\rho,{\mathbf S}_\mu)\) is non-zero, and the author computes its dimension. Then the author describes all types of generalized Weitzenböck formulae by twisting the Dirac operator with an irreducible bundle \({\mathbf S}_\rho\). At the end of the paper, he applies these formulae to obtain commutation relations of the Lichnerowicz Laplacian with generalized gradients, and to obtain an optimal estimate of the first eigenvalue of the Laplacian on associated bundles under a certain curvature restriction.