Fixed-point free SU(n)-actions on acyclic manifolds (Q919321)

Oliver showed that a compact Lie group G has a fixed point free action on a disk if the identity component \(G_ 0\) of G is non-abelian, or if \(G/G_ 0\) is non-solvable. Little is known about the minimal dimension in which such fixed point free actions exist. Oliver showed that this minimal dimension is 8 for \(G=SO(3)\). The author investigates the minimum dimension of compact smooth \({\mathbb{Z}}_ p\)-acyclic manifolds with fixed point free \(SU(p+1)\)-actions. The principal results give sharp lower bounds for these minimal dimensions in some specific cases. Theorem. Let p (p\(\neq 3)\) be a prime number and let X be a \({\mathbb{Q}}\)- acyclic smooth manifold with fixed point free smooth \(SU(p+1)\)-action. If \(X^{S(U(p)\times U(1))}\neq \emptyset\), \(X^{\tilde S_{p+1}}\neq \emptyset\) and \(X^{\tilde S_ p}\) is connected, then \[ \dim X\quad \geq \quad (1/4)(p+1)^ 2(p+4)p-1=\dim X_ m(p+1,p). \] In this theorem, \(X_ m(p+1,p)\) is a manifold which satisfies the assumptions of the theorem, constructed in Section 2 of the paper. The group \(\tilde S_ p\) is the normalizer \(N(ST_{p+1})\) of \(ST_{p+1}\), a maximal torus. Theorem B. Let X be a copact \({\mathbb{Z}}_ 2\)-acyclic smooth manifold with fixed point free SU(3)-action. Then dim \(X\geq 26=\dim X_ m(3,2)\).