Precisely monotone sets in step-2 rank-3 Carnot algebras

A subset of a Carnot group is said to be precisely monotone if the restriction of its characteristic function to each integral curve of every left-invariant horizontal vector field is monotone. Equivalently, a precisely monotone set is a h-convex set with h-convex complement. Such sets have been introduced and classified in the Heisenberg setting by Cheeger and Kleiner in the 2010's. In the present paper, we study precisely monotone sets in the wider setting of step-2 Carnot groups, equivalently step-2 Carnot algebras. In addition to general properties, we prove a classification in step-2 rank-3 Carnot algebras that generalizes the classification already known in the Heisenberg setting using sublevel sets of h-affine functions. A significant novelty is that such sublevel sets can be different from half-spaces.