On the compactness of the set of invariant Einstein metrics

TL;DR

This paper studies the structure and compactness of the set of invariant Einstein metrics on certain homogeneous spaces, using convex polytopes and moment maps to extend and analyze the Einstein equation solutions.

Contribution

It introduces a geometric approach using Newton polytopes and moment maps to analyze invariant Einstein metrics, providing a new proof of their compactness without relying on spectrum simplicity.

Findings

Solutions at the boundary are locally Euclidean.

The set of Einstein metrics is compact.

Explicit description of boundary solutions and triangulation.

Abstract

Let $M = G/H$ be a connected simply connected homogeneous manifold of a compact, not necessarily connected Lie group $G$. We will assume that the isotropy $H$-module $\mathfrak {g/h}$ has a simple spectrum, i.e. irreducible submodules are mutually non-equivalent. There exists a convex Newton polytope $N=N(G,H)$, which was used for the estimation of the number of isolated complex solutions of the algebraic Einstein equation for invariant metrics on $G/H$ (up to scaling). Using the moment map, we identify the space $\mathcal{M}_1$ of invariant Riemannian metrics of volume 1 on $G/H$ with the interior of this polytope $N$. We associate with a point ${x \in \partial N}$ of the boundary a homogeneous Riemannian space (in general, only local) and we extend the Einstein equation to $\bar{\mathcal{M}_1}= N$. As an application of the Aleksevsky--Kimel'fel'd theorem, we prove that all solutions of the Einstein equation associated with points of the boundary are locally Euclidean. We describe explicitly the set $T\subset \partial N$ of solutions at the boundary together with its natural triangulation. Investigating the compactification $\bar{\mathcal{M}_1} $ of $\mathcal{M}_1$, we get an algebraic proof of the deep result by B\"ohm, Wang and Ziller about the compactness of the set $ \mathcal{E}_1 \subset \mathcal{M}_1$ of Einstein metrics. The original proof by B\"ohm, Wang and Ziller was based on a different approach and did not use the simplicity of the spectrum. In Appendix we consider the non-symmetric K\"ahler homogeneous spaces $G/H$ with the second Betti number $b_2=1$. We write the normalized volumes $2,6,20,82,344$ of the corresponding Newton polytopes and discuss the number of complex solutions of the algebraic Einstein equation and the finiteness problem.