On the geometry of Urysohn's universal metric space (Q864454)

A~Polish space is a~\textit{universal} metric space if it contains an isometric copy of every Polish space. The first construction of a~universal Polish space is due to P.~S. Urysohn. The Urysohn space~\(\mathbb U\) is also \textit{\(\omega\)-homogeneous} which means that every isometry between finite subsets of~\(U\) can be extended to an isometry of~\(\mathbb U\). The author proves that \(\mathbb U\) is isomorphic to \(\mathbb U\setminus B\) where \(B\) is any open ball of~\(\mathbb U\) and any Polish space is isometric to the set of fixed points of some isometry of~\(\mathbb U\). Next the author studies a~question of Urysohn, who asked whether \(\mathbb U\) had stronger homogeneity properties than \(\omega\)-homogeneity. It is well known that every isometry between compact subsets of~\(\mathbb U\) can be extended to an isometry of~\(\mathbb U\). The author proves the converse: If \(X_1,X_2\subseteq\mathbb U\) are isometric and every isometry \(\varphi:X_1\to X_2\) can be extended to an isometry of~\(\mathbb U\), then \(X_1\),~\(X_2\) are compact. Therefore compact homogeneity is the strongest homogeneity property of~\(\mathbb U\).