No Arabic abstract
We describe natural Hamiltonian systems using projective geometry. The null lift procedure endows the tangent bundle with a projective structure where the null Hamiltonian is identified with a projective conic and induces a Weyl geometry. Projective transformations generate a set of known and new dualities between Hamiltonian systems, as for example the phenomenon of coupling-constant metamorphosis. We conclude outlining how this construction can be extended to the quantum case for Eisenhart-Duval lifts.
We construct the normal forms of null-Kahler metrics: pseudo-Riemannian metrics admitting a compatible parallel nilpotent endomorphism of the tangent bundle. Such metrics are examples of non-Riemannian holonomy reduction, and (in the complexified setting) appear in the Bridgeland stability conditions of the moduli spaces of Calabi-Yau three-folds. Using twistor methods we show that, in dimension four - where there is a connection with dispersionless integrability - the cohomogeneity-one anti-self-dual null-Kahler metrics are generically characterised by solutions to Painleve I or Painleve II ODEs.
We construct several examples of compactifications of Einstein metrics. We show that the Eguchi--Hanson instanton admits a projective compactification which is non--metric, and that a metric cone over any (pseudo)--Riemannian manifolds admits a metric projective compactification. We construct a para--$c$--projective compactification of neutral signature Einstein metrics canonically defined on certain rank--$n$ affine bundles $M$ over $n$-dimensional manifolds endowed with projective structures.
A formulation of singular classical theories (determined by degenerate Lagrangians) without constraints is presented. A partial Hamiltonian formalism in the phase space having an initially arbitrary number of momenta (which can be smaller than the number of velocities) is proposed. The equations of motion become first-order differential equations, and they coincide with those of multi-time dynamics, if a certain condition is imposed. In a singular theory, this condition is fulfilled in the case of the coincidence of the number of generalized momenta with the rank of the Hessian matrix. The noncanonical generalized velocities satisfy a system of linear algebraic equations, which allows an appropriate classification of singular theories (gauge and nongauge). A new antisymmetric bracket (similar to the Poisson bracket) is introduced, which describes the time evolution of physical quantities in a singular theory. The origin of constraints is shown to be a consequence of the (unneeded in our formulation) extension of the phase space. In this case the new bracket transforms into the Dirac bracket. Quantization is briefly discussed.
We establish an explicit correspondence between two--dimensional projective structures admitting a projective vector field, and a class of solutions to the $SU(infty)$ Toda equation. We give several examples of new, explicit solutions of the Toda equation, and construct their mini--twistor spaces. Finally we discuss the projective-to-Einstein correspondence, which gives a neutral signature Einstein metric on a cotangent bundle $T^*N$ of any projective structure $(N, [ abla])$. We show that there is a canonical Einstein of metric on an $R^*$--bundle over $T^*N$, with a connection whose curvature is the pull--back of the natural symplectic structure from $T^*N$.
In the context of (2+1)--dimensional quantum gravity with negative cosmological constant and topology R x T^2, constant matrix--valued connections generate a q--deformed representation of the fundamental group, and signed area phases relate the quantum matrices assigned to homotopic loops. Some features of the resulting quantum geometry are explored, and as a consequence a quantum version of the Goldman bracket is obtained