Spherical conjugacy classes and involutions in the Weyl group (Q938255)

Let \(G\) be a simple algebraic group over an algebraically closed field of characteristic zero or an odd good characteristic. Let \(B\) be a Borel subgroup of \(G\). A conjugacy class \(\mathcal O\) of \(G\) is said to be spherical if \(B\) has a dense orbit in \(\mathcal O\). The article under review contains a number of interesting results on spherical conjugacy classes. First, it is shown that the spherical conjugacy classes of \(G\) intersect only double cosets of \(B\) in \(G\) corresponding to involutions in the Weyl group of \(G\) (Theorem~1). Let \(w\in W\) be the involution such that the dense \(B\)-orbit in \(\mathcal O\) is contained in \(BwB\). Using Theorem~1, the author proves that \(\ell(w)+\text{ rk}(1-w)=\dim(\mathcal O)\), where \(\ell\) is the usual length function on \(W\). This extends to the case of fields of an odd good characteristic a characterization of spherical conjugacy classes obtained by \textit{N.~Cantarini, M.~Costantini} and the author [Transformation Groups 10, 29--65 (2005; Zbl 1101.17006)]. It is also shown that the highest weights occurring in the \(G\)-module decomposition of the ring of regular functions on \(\mathcal O\) are self-adjoint and contained in the \((-1)\)-eigenspace of \(w\).