Yes to both questions. Since has top degree, . Moreover , so the formula for the codifferential gives
Therefore
and the Riemannian volume form is a harmonic differential form.
The Levi-Civita connection preserves both the Riemannian metric and its chosen orientation. At any point, extend a positively oriented orthonormal basis to a local frame whose covariant derivatives vanish at that point. Differentiating there gives . Hence is a parallel differential form.
Positive Laplace-Beltrami operator Created 2026-10-06 Updated 2026-10-14
The positive convention for the Laplace-Beltrami operator is , where is the codifferential. It is the restriction of the Hodge Laplacian to functions. In coordinates,
On a compact boundaryless Riemannian manifold, or for compactly supported functions, . The opposite convention is also standard; formulas involving the sign must specify which is used.
For a function and one-form , the codifferential obeys . This follows from the graded Leibniz rule and the definition of the Hodge star operator. Applying it to gives the product formula. In particular . The cross-term sign reverses for the opposite Laplace-Beltrami operator convention.
Self-dual primitive of an exact three-form Created 2026-10-06 Updated 2026-10-07
On a compact oriented Riemannian manifold of dimension four without boundary, every exact three-form has a self-dual two-form primitive. Write and use the Hodge decomposition theorem to split . Then . For , the codifferential identity and the fact on two-forms give , so . Thus satisfies and . It is twice the self-dual projection of , rather than the projection itself.