Reversible quaternionic hyperbolic isometries

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Publication:2174518



Abstract: Let G be a group. An element g in G is called reversible if it is conjugate to g−1 within G, and called strongly reversible if it is conjugate to its inverse by an order two element of G. Let extbfHmathbbHn be the n-dimensional quaternionic hyperbolic space. Let mathrmPSp(n,1) be the isometry group of extbfHmathbbHn. In this paper, we classify reversible and strongly reversible elements in mathrmSp(n) and mathrmSp(n,1). Also, we prove that all the elements of mathrmPSp(n,1) are strongly reversible.


This is a study of properties of cetain isometry groups related to \(n\)-dimensional quaternionic hyperbolic spaces. With \({\mathbb H}\) denoting the quaternions, \(V:= {\mathbb H}^{n,1} ={\mathbb H}^{n+1}\) is an \((n + 1)\)-dimensional right vector space over \({\mathbb H}\), equipped with an \({\mathbb H}\)-Hermitian form \(\Phi(z, w) = -\overline{z_0}w_0 + \overline{z_1}w_1 +\ldots + \overline{z_n}w_n\), where \(z = (z_0, z_1,\dots, z_n)\), \(w = (w_0, w_1,\dots, w_n) \in {\mathbb H}^{n+1}\). The matrix representation of \(\Phi\) with respect to the standard basis \({e_0, e_1,\dots, e_n}\) of \({\mathbb H}^{n+1}\) is \(J = \mathrm{diag}(-1, 1,\dots,1)\). The symplectic group of signature \((n, 1)\) is \(\mathrm{Sp}(n, 1) = \{g \in \mathrm{GL}(n + 1, {\mathbb H})\mid ^t\overline{g}Jg = J\}\). Also, let \(\mathrm{Sp}(n) := \{g \in \mathrm{GL}(n, H) \mid ^t\overline{g}g = I_n \}\). The group of isometries of the \(n\)-dimensional hyperbolic space over \({\mathbb H}\), \(\mathrm{PSp}(n,1)\) is \(\mathrm{Sp}(n,1)/Z(\mathrm{Sp}(n,1)\), where \(Z(\mathrm{Sp}(n,1))=\{\pm I_n\}\) is the center of \(\mathrm{Sp}(n,1)\). For any group \(G\), an element \(g \in G\) is called reversible if \(g^{-1} = xgx^{-1}\) for some \(x\in G\). It is called strongly reversible if the \(x\) above is such that \(x^2=1\). This paper's main results are: (i) Every element of \(\mathrm{Sp}(n, 1)\) is reversible; (ii) An element \(g \in \mathrm{Sp}(n)\) is strongly reversible if and only if every eigenvalue class of \(g\) is either \(\pm 1\) or of even multiplicity; (iii) For \(n > 1\), every element in \(\mathrm{Sp}(n)\) can be expressed as a product of four (respectively, five) involutions if \(n\) is even (resectively, \(n\) is odd); (iv) Every element of \(\mathrm{PSp}(n, 1)\) is a product of two involutions (i.e., \(\mathrm{PSp}(n, 1)\) is bireflectional) .











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