Curved flats in symmetric spaces

Abstract

In this paper we study maps (curved flats) into symmetric spaces which are tangent at each point to a flat of the symmetric space. Important examples of such maps arise from isometric immersions of space forms into space forms via their Gauss maps. Further examples are found in conformal geometry, e.g. the curved flats obtained from isothermic surfaces and conformally flat 3-folds in the 4-sphere. Curved flats admit a 1-parameter family of deformations (spectral parameter) which enables us to make contact to integrable system theory. In fact, we give a recipe to construct curved flats (and thus the above mentioned geometric objects) from a hierarchy of finite dimensional algebraically completely integrable flows.