On the existence of harmonic morphisms from certain symmetric spaces (Q864241)

This paper is devoted to the study of some properties of harmonic morphisms defined on a Riemannian manifold with values in a surface. The authors are concerned with the following problem. Let \((M^m,g)\) be an irreductible Riemannian symmetric space of dimension \(m\geq 2\). For each point \(p\in M\) there exists a complex-valued harmonic morphism \(\phi :U\rightarrow \mathbb C\) defined on an open neighbourhood \(U\) of \(p\). If the space \((M,g)\) is of non-compact type then the domain \(U\) can be chosen to be the whole of \(M\). The main result of the paper gives a positive answer to this problem in the cases when \((M,g)\) is one of the non-compact irreducible Riemannian symmetric spaces SL\(_n(\mathbb R)/\)SO\((n)\), SU\(^*(2n)/\text{Sp}(n)\), or their compact dual spaces SU\((n)/\)SO\((n)\), SU\((2n)/\)Sp\((n)\). The existence of globally defined, complex-valued harmonic morphisms from any Riemannian symmetric space of type IV is also established in the present paper.