Free actions of connected Lie groups of rank one on certain spaces

Abstract

Let $G$ be a connected Lie group of rank one. In this paper the existence of free actions of group $G$ on spheres, real projective spaces and lens spaces has been studied. Most of the results have been obtained for finitistic spaces with cohomology ring isomorphic to the cohomology ring of these spaces. The cohomology algebra of the orbit space has been determined in the case of free $G$-action. The non-existence of $G$-equivariant maps from spheres to cohomology spheres has also been established.