Obstructions to positive curvature and symmetry

We discuss new obstructions to positive sectional curvature and symmetry. The main result asserts that the index of the Dirac operator twisted with the tangent bundle vanishes on a 2-connected manifold of dimension ≠8 if the manifold admits a metric of positive sectional curvature and isometric effective S¹-action. The proof relies on the rigidity theorem for elliptic genera and properties of totally geodesic submanifolds.