Homology of classical Lie groups made discrete. I: Stability theorems and Schur multipliers (Q1085492)

Many interesting Lie groups belong to one of the infinite families \(\{G_ n\}\) of classical groups, and one approach to studying their homology is to apply the approach used in algebraic K-theory: prove a stability theorem relating \(H_ i(G_ n)\) to \(H_ i(G_{n+1})\), then calculate the stable groups \(H_ i(\lim_{\to}G_ n)\). In this paper the author uses the special nature of classical Lie groups to prove directly stability theorems for the homology of the real, complex or quaternionic groups, which are sharper than those deducible directly from K-theory, and he determines the stable value of the \(H_ 2's\) (Schur multipliers) for the real groups. As a corollary, he is able to deduce that the homologies of G and of ''G made discrete'' are the same with finite field coefficients.