Ricci Flows with Nilpotent Symmetry and Zero Bundle Curvature

We use Lott’s functional and construct a new functional to derive rigidity results for invariant Ricci flow blowdown limits on nilpotent principal bundles with zero associated curvature. Consequently, we prove that the blowdown limit is locally an expanding Ricci soliton when the structure group is the three dimensional Heisenberg group. In addition, we classify this soliton when the base manifold is one dimensional. This, together with Lott’s work in the abelian setting, yields a complete local classification of invariant Ricci flow blowdown limits on four dimensional, nilpotent principal bundles.