A note on rectifiable spaces (Q411810)

The authors study the classes of rectifiable spaces and paratopological groups which are generalizations of topological groups. A topological space \(G\) is \textit{rectifiable} if there is a surjective homeomorphism \(\varphi:G\times G\to G\times G\) and an element \(e\in G\) such that \(\pi_1\circ\varphi=\pi_1\) and for every \(x\in G\), \(\varphi(x,x)=(x,e)\), where \(\pi_1:G\times G\to G\) is the projection to the first coordinate. A \textit{paratopological group} \(G\) is a group with a topology on the set \(G\) that makes the multiplication mapping \(G\times G\to G\) continuous, when \(G\times G\) is given the product topology. First, the authors prove that the separable Hilbert space \(l_2^{\infty}\) is homeomorphic to no rectifiable space or paratopological group. In [Topology Appl. 157, No. 4, 789--799 (2010; Zbl 1192.54009)] \textit{A. V. Arhangel'skiĭ} and \textit{M. M. Choban} posed the question: Is every rectifiable \(p\)-space with countable Souslin number Lindelöf? What if we assume the space to be separable? Separable and locally compact? In Section 4, the authors give an affirmative answer to the question for separable and locally compact rectifiable spaces. That is, they prove that every locally compact and separable rectifiable space is \(\sigma\)-compact, and hence it is Lindelöf. Furthermore, in Section 5, they show that for a sequential rectifiable space, the following are equivalent: (1) \(G\) is an \(\alpha_4\)-space; (2) \(G\) is an \(AS\)-space; (3) \(G\) is Fréchet-Urysohn; (4) \(G\) is strongly Fréchet-Urysohn. The authors also discuss the metrizability of rectifiable spaces and consider the remainders of rectifiable spaces.