Slices and transfers (Q612986)

The construction of a motivic Postnikov tower is the analog of the classical Postnikov tower in the setting of motivic stable homotopy theory. Let \(k\) be a field of characteristic \(0\) and let \({\mathcal S}{\mathcal H}(k)\) denote the motivic stable homotopy category of \(\mathbb{P}^1\)-spectra. V. Voevodsky and the author have shown that the 0th slice of the sphere spectrum \(\mathbb{S}\) in \({\mathcal S}{\mathcal H}(k)\) is isomorphic to \({\mathcal H}\mathbb{Z}\). Each \(E\in{\mathcal S}{\mathcal H}(k)\) has a canonical structure of a module over the sphere spectrum \(\mathbb{S}\) and thus the slices \(s_nE\) acquire a \({\mathcal H}\mathbb{Z}\)-module structure, in \({\mathcal S}{\mathcal H}(k)_{S^1}\). Let \({\mathbf S}{\mathbf p}{\mathbf t}_{S^1}(k)\) denote the category of \(S^1\)-spectra, with its homotopy category (for the \(\mathbb{A}^1\) model structure) \({\mathcal S}{\mathcal H}_{S^1}(k)\). The analog for motives is the category of complexes of presheaves with transfer and its \(\mathbb{A}^1\) homotopy category \(DM^{\text{eff}}(k)\). In this paper the author considers the motivic Postnikov tower in \({\mathcal S}{\mathcal H}_{S^1}(k)\) and asks whether the slices \(s_nE\) may have a natural structure of Eilenberg-Maclane spectra of a homotopy invariant complex of preasheaves with transfers. The following are his main results about the motivic structure on the slices of \(S^1\)-spectra. Theorem 1. Let \(E\) be an \(S^1\)-spectrum. Then for each \(n\geq 1\) there is a tower \[ \cdots\to\rho_{\geq p+1} s_n E\to \rho_{\geq p}s_nE\to\cdots\to s_nE \] in \({\mathcal H}_{S^1}(k)\) with the following properties: (1) the tower is natural in \(E\). (2) Let \(s_{p,n}E\) be the cofiber of the map \(\rho_{\geq p+1}s_n E\to\rho_{\geq p}s_n E\). Then there is a homotopy invariant complex of presheaves with transfers \(\widetilde\pi_p((s_n(E)^{(n)})^*\) in \(DM^{\text{eff}}_-(k)\) and a natural isomorphism in \({\mathcal S}{\mathcal H}_{S^1}(k)\) \[ EM_{{\mathcal A}^1}(\widetilde\pi_p((s_n(E)^{(n)})^*\simeq s_{p,n} E, \] where \(EM_{{\mathcal A}^1}: DM^{\text{eff}}_-(k)\to{\mathcal S}{\mathcal H}_{S^1}(k)\) is the Eilenberg-Maclane spectrum functor. The author also mentions a (rather vague!) relation between the above results and the problem of finding motivic properties of a smooth projective variety \(X\) over a field \(k\), admitting a 0-cycle of degree 1, that lead to to the existence of a \(k\)-point or, conversely, that give obstructions to the existence of such a point.