Actions of totally disconnected groups and equivariant singular homology (Q602035)

This article concerns \(G\)-equivariant singular homology when \(G\) is a totally disconnected, locally compact group. The main result is that a short exact sequence of covariant coefficient systems for \(G\) induces a long exact sequence in \(G\)-equivariant singular homology. This essentially follows from the fact that the equivariant singular chain complex can be written as a sum of coefficient modules, as the author proves. The second part of the paper deals with an application to the short exact sequence of coefficient systems \(I \rightarrow \Lambda \rightarrow \underline{R}\); here \(R\) is a ring, \(\underline{R}\) is the coefficient system with constant value \(R\) and \(\Lambda\) is the \textit{natural coefficient system for \(G\)}, which takes value \(R(G/H)\) at a \(G\)-orbit \(G/H\). The author proves that \(G\)-equivariant singular homology with coefficients in \(\Lambda\) is naturally isomorphic to ordinary singular homology with coefficients in \(R\) \[ H^G_\ast(X,\Lambda) \cong H_\ast(X,R). \] Moreover, with the additional hypothesis of \(G\) being compact (ie.~a profinite group), and the \(G\)-action being \textit{free}, \(G\)-equivariant singular homology with coefficients in \(\underline{R}\) is naturally isomorphic to singular homology of the orbit space and coefficients in \(R\) \[ H^G_\ast(X,\underline{R}) \cong H_\ast(X/G,R). \] (Both results above also hold in the relative case.) All in all, the author obtains a long exact sequence \[ \ldots \rightarrow H_n^G(X,I) \rightarrow H_n(X,R) \rightarrow H_n(X/G,R) \rightarrow H_{n-1}^G(X,I) \rightarrow \ldots \] The main motivation behind these results is the Hilbert-Smith conjecture, which is known to be equivalent to an statement about actions of \(p\)-adic groups on topological manifolds.