Dynamical convexity and closed orbits on symmetric spheres

Abstract

Our main theme here is the dynamics of Reeb flows with symmetries on the standard contact sphere. We introduce the notion of strong dynamical convexity for contact forms invariant under a group action, supporting the standard contact structure, and prove that in dimension 2n+1 any such contact form satisfying a condition slightly weaker than strong dynamical convexity has at least n+1 simple closed Reeb orbits. For contact forms with antipodal symmetry, we prove that strong dynamical convexity is a consequence of ordinary convexity. In dimension 5 or greater, we construct examples of antipodally symmetric, dynamically convex contact forms which are not strongly dynamically convex, and thus not contactomorphic to convex ones via a contactomorphism commuting with the antipodal map. Finally, we relax this condition on the contactomorphism furnishing a condition that has nonempty C1-interior.