Planes in quadratic 4-space and associated shapes of lattices

Abstract

Let $Q=-x_1^1-x_2^2-x_3^2+x_4^2$ be the standard signature $(1,3)$ quadratic form. To each non-degenerate rational plane $L$ in the four-dimensional quadratic space $(\mathbb{Q}^4,Q)$ we can naturally attach a periodic geodesic on the Bianchi orbifold $\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{Z}[i])\backslash \mathbb{H}^3$ which records the position of $L$ in the Grassmannian up to integer rotations. Moreover, each such plane $L$ defines a CM point and a periodic geodesic on the modular curve through restriction of $Q$ to $L$ and its orthogonal complement. Lastly, the local isomorphism between $\mathrm{SO}_{1,3}(\mathbb{R})$ and $\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{C})$ gives rise to a further periodic geodesic on the Bianchi orbifold. In this article, we exhibit a natural coupling of all the above objects and prove simultaneous equidistribution under a Linnik-type splitting condition. The main ingredient is the classification of joinings of higher-rank diagonalizable actions on homogeneous spaces due to Einsiedler and Lindenstrauss.