Spin manifolds, Einstein metrics, and differential topology (Q699278)

It is shown that there exist smooth, simply connected, 4-dimensional spin manifolds which do not admit Einstein metrics, but satisfy the strict Hitchin-Thorpe inequality \(2\chi(M)>3|\tau(M)|\). The construction makes use of the Bauer/Furuta cohomotopy refinement of Seiberg-Witten invariant and leads to many examples of topological 4-manifolds which admit an Einstein metric for one smooth structure, but which have infinitely many other smooth structures for which no Einstein metric can exist. See also \textit{C. Le Brun}, Math. Res. Lett. 5, No. 4, 423-438 (1998; Zbl 0977.53044), and \textit{P. B. Kronheimer}, Invent. Math. 135, No. 1, 45-61 (1999; Zbl 0917.57017).