No label defined (Q4510897)

This is a nice detailed survey on results related with submanifolds of Riemannian manifolds with parallel second fundamental forms, i.e., \(\overline\nabla h=0\). For a submanifold \(M^m\) in Euclidean \(n\)-space \(E^n\) with parallel second fundamental form, the Gauss image of \(M^m\) is a totally geodesic submanifold of the Grassmannian. D. Ferus proved that a submanifold \(M^m\) with parallel second fundamental form in \(E^n\) has the property of local extrinsic symmetry. These submanifolds are known as symmetric submanifolds. Another result proved by Ferus is that a general symmetric submanifold of \(E^n\) reduces to a product of irreducible symmetric submanifolds lying in a sphere. M. Takeuchi studied submanifolds in complete Riemannian spaces of constant curvature with parallel second fundamental form. It is natural to extend the study to submanifolds satisfying the condition \(\overline\nabla^2 h=0\). These manifolds were included into a more general class of submanifolds, called semiparallel submanifolds, which are characterized by \(\overline R\circ h=0\). Every semiparallel submanifold is intrinsically a semisymmetric Riemannian manifold, just like a parallel submanifold is a (locally) symmetric one. For Riemannian manifolds it is known that \(\overline\nabla{}^k R=0\) implies \(\nabla R=0\), but not the converse. Submanifolds characterized by \(\overline \nabla{}^k h=0\) with \(\overline\nabla{}^{k-1} h\neq 0\) are called \(k\)-parallel submanifolds. The author provides in this paper a detailed survey on results related with these submanifolds. For the entire collection see [Zbl 1069.00010].