Smooth conjugacy classes of 3D Axiom A flows

Abstract

We show a rigidity result for 3-dimensional contact Axiom A flows: given two 3D contact Axiom A flows $\Phi_1,\Phi_2$ whose restrictions $\Phi_1|_{\Lambda_1},\Phi_2|_{\Lambda_2}$ to basic sets $\Lambda_1,\Lambda_2$ are orbit equivalent, we prove that if periodic orbits in correspondence have the same length, then the conjugacy is as regular as the flows and respects the contact structure, extending a previous result due to Feldman-Ornstein [21]. Some of the ideas are reminiscent of the work of Otal [51]. As an application, we show that the billiard maps of two open dispersing billiards without eclipse and with the same marked length spectrum are smoothly conjugated.