Recovering unitary calculus from calculus with reality (Q6161096)

In [Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 347, No. 10, 3743--3796 (1995; Zbl 0866.55020)] \textit{M. Weiss} introduced the `orthogonal calculus' for continuous functors from the category of finite-dimensional real inner product spaces to the category of based topological spaces. Every such functor has a `Taylor tower' which includes a sequence of `polynomial' approximations which systematically decompose the functor into `homogeneous' pieces. Those pieces or `derivatives' are classified by a sequence of spectra together with actions of the orthogonal groups. Replacing real inner product spaces with complex (hermitian) inner product spaces, and the orthogonal groups with unitary groups, we obtain a corresponding `unitary calculus'. The author of the current paper introduced in [\textit{N. Taggart}, Glasg. Math. J. 64, No. 1, 197--230 (2022; Zbl 1480.55013)] a theory intermediate to the orthogonal and unitary calculi, namely a `unitary calculus with reality'. Let \(\mathcal{J}_0^{\mathbf{R}}\) denote the category whose objects are those finite-dimensional complex inner product spaces of the form \(\mathbb{C} \otimes V\) for a finite-dimensional real inner product space \(V\), with morphisms the complex isometries. The cyclic group \(C_2\) acts on the mapping spaces of \(\mathcal{J}_0^{\mathbf{R}}\) by complex conjugation on source and target, and so we can consider functors \[ F: \mathcal{J}^{\mathbf{R}}_0 \to C_2\mathrm{Top}_* \] which are \(C_2\)-equivariant on those mapping spaces. The unitary calculus with reality provides to such a functor \(F\) a tower of polynomial approximations \[ F \to \cdots \to T_n^{\mathbf{R}}F \to \cdots \] for which the homogeneous layers are classified by spectra with an action of \(C_2 \ltimes U(n)\). The purpose of this paper is to show that we can recover the ordinary unitary calculus of such a functor \(F\) from its calculus with reality simply by forgetting the \(C_2\)-actions (and invoking a change of universe functor between \(\mathcal{J}^{\mathbf{R}}_0\) and the category of all finite-dimensional complex inner product spaces). The author provides detailed results comparing, via model structures, the polynomials functors, homogeneous functors, Taylor towers, and derivatives, in the two contexts. One application of the comparison is given: to stable splittings, generalizing work of \textit{G. Arone} [Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 129, No. 4, 1207--1211 (2001; Zbl 0978.55007)] to the setting of unitary calculus with reality.