A 4-dimensional 1-LCC shrinking theorem (Q5928491)

A compact subset \(A\) of a topological manifold \(M\) is said to be a cell-like set if \(A\) can be deformed to a point in any neighborhood of itself. A map \(f: M\to X\) is said to be a cell-like mapping if \(f^{-1}(x)\) is a nonempty cell-like subset of \(M\) for every \(x\in X\). An important problem in the geometric topology of manifolds is that of understanding cell-like images of manifolds. This is related to the shrinking problem for decompositions of topological 4-manifolds [\textit{J. W. Cannon}, Ann. Math. (2) 110, 83-112 (1979; Zbl 0424.57007); \textit{R. J. Daverman}, Decompositions of manifolds, Pure Appl. Math., Academic Press 124 (1986; Zbl 0608.57002); \textit{R. D. Edwards}, Proc. int. Congr. Math., Helsinki 1978, Vol. 1, 111-127 (1980; Zbl 0428.57004)]. The main result of this beautiful paper is a 4-dimensional 1-LCC shrinking theorem. More precisely, let \(f:M\to X\) be a closed, cell-like mapping of a 4-manifold \(M\) onto a metric space \(X\) and let \(Y\) be a closed subset of \(X\) such that \(X\smallsetminus Y\) is a 4-manifold and \(Y\) is locally simply co-connected (abbreviated as 1-LCC) in \(X\). Recall that \(Y\) is 1-LCC in \(X\) if for any \(y\in Y\) and for any neighborhood \(U\) of \(y\) there exists a neighborhood \(V\) of \(y\) such that \(V\subset U\) and each map from the boundary of a 2-cell in \(V\smallsetminus Y\) can be extended to a map from the 2-cell in \(U\smallsetminus Y\). Under this hypothesis, the map \(f\) can be approximated by homeomorphisms provided \(Y\) is a 1-dimensional ANR. Furthermore, the same conclusion is also obtained if \(Y\) is an arbitrary closed \(0\)-dimensional subset or if \(Y\) contains a closed \(0\)-dimensional subset \(C\) such that \(Y\smallsetminus C\) is a \(1\)-dimensional ANR.