Secondary Characteristic Classes on Loop Spaces

A Riemannian metric on a manifold M induces a family of Riemannian metrics on the loop space LM depending on a Sobolev space parameter s. The connection and curvature forms of these metrics take values in pseudodifferential operators. We develop a theory of Wodzicki-Chern-Simons classes using the s=0, 1 connections and the Wodzicki residue. These classes distinguish the smooth homotopy type of some circle actions on M = S^2 x S^3, and imply that the fundamental group of Diff(M) is infinite.

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