Spherical actions on isotropic flag varieties and related branching rules

Abstract

Let $G$ be a symplectic or special orthogonal group, let $H$ be a connected reductive subgroup of $G$, and let $X$ be a flag variety of $G$. We classify all triples $(G,H,X)$ such that the natural action of $H$ on $X$ is spherical. For each of these triples, we determine the restrictions to $H$ of all irreducible representations of $G$ realized in spaces of sections of homogeneous line bundles on $X$.