arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Jan Slovák.
These notes present elementary introduction to tractors based on classical examples, together with glimpses towards modern invariant differential calculus related to vast class of Cartan geometries, the so called parabolic geometries.
We consider the curved geometries modelled on the homogeneous space $G/P$, where $G=SL(6,\mathbb R)$ acts transitively on the Grassmannian $Gr(3,3)$ of three-dimensional subspaces in $\mathbb R^6$, and $P$ is the corresponding isotropic subgroup. We classify the strongly invariant operators between sections of vector bundles induced on such geometries by irreducible $P$-modules, i.e., those obtained via homomorphisms of semi-holonomic Verma modules.
The famous Erlangen Programme was coined by Felix Klein in 1872 as an algebraic approach allowing to incorporate fixed symmetry groups as the core ingredient for geometric analysis, seeing the chosen symmetries as intrinsic invariance of all objects and tools. This idea was broadened essentially by Elie Cartan in the beginning of the last century, and we may consider (curved) geometries as modelled over certain (flat) Klein's models. The aim of this short survey is to explain carefully the basic concepts and algebraic tools built over several recent decades. We focus on the direct link between the jets of sections of homogeneous bundles and the associated induced modules, allowing us to understand the overall structure of invariant linear differential operators in purely algebraic terms. This allows us to extend essential parts of the concepts and procedures to the curved cases.
We exploit the Cartan-Kähler theory to prove the local existence of real analytic quaternionic contact structures for any prescribed values of the respective curvature functions and their covariant derivatives at a given point on a manifold. We show that, in a certain sense, the different real analytic quaternionic contact geometries in $4n+3$ dimensions depend, modulo diffeomorphisms, on $2n+2$ real analytic functions of $2n+3$ variables.
Following the Cartans's original method of equivalence supported by methods of parabolic geometry, we provide a complete solution for the equivalence problem of quaternionic contact structures, that is, the problem of finding a complete system of differential invariants for two quaternionic contact manifolds to be locally diffeomorphic. This includes an explicit construction of the corresponding Cartan geometry and detailed information on all curvature components.