Quasi-isometry classification of some manifolds of bounded geometry (Q1340612)

A complete Riemannian manifold \(M\) is said to have bounded geometry, or just \(bg\), if the injectivity radius is bounded away from zero and the sectional curvature is bounded above in absolute value. A smooth map between such manifolds is \(bg\) if it is effectively proper and of uniformly bounded \(C^2\) norm. A simplicial complex \(X\) is \(bg\) if there is an upper bound on the number of simplices in the link of any vertex. A simplicial map between such complexes is \(bg\), if the inverse image of each simplex has a uniformly bounded number of simplices, and the map is effectively proper. The propriety condition is not actually mentioned in the paper, transversality; but the author has confirmed that it must be included in Definition 1.2. There is also a \(bg\) notion in the world of CW complexes. With these \(bg\) notions established, the author develops \(bg\) versions of classical algebraic and (high dimensional) geometric topology such as a simplicial approximation theorem; transversality; homology and homotopy ``groups''; Hurewicz and Whitehead type theorems; Whitehead groups (a geometric and an algebraic one); an \(s\)-cobordism theorem; Poincaré duality spaces; Spivak normal fibrations; structure sets on manifolds; and geometrically defined surgery groups. Part of this development is (and is also clearly acknowledged as) a direct adaptation from the reviewer's joint work with \textit{D. R. Anderson} [Boundedly controlled topology, Lect. Notes Math. 1323 (1988; Zbl 0646.57001)]. The main results obtained from (or about) these \(bg\) notions include a computation of the geometric \(bg\) Whitehead group for \(M\times\mathbb{R}\) for any compact manifold \(M\); a short exact sequence determination of the structure set \({\mathcal S}^{\text{bg},s} (M \times\mathbb{R})\); and a proof of the following Theorem: Let \(M^n\), \(N^n\) be compact manifolds, \(n\geq 5\), \(f:N \to M \times S^1\) a homotopy equivalence. Then the infinite cyclic cover of \(f\) is a map which is \(bg\) homotopic to a smooth quasi-isometry \(\widetilde f: \widetilde N \to M \times\mathbb{R}\) if and only if a finite cover of \(f\) is homotopic to a diffeomorphism to \(M \times S^1\). The above mentioned computations involve fine, uniformly finite homology groups as developed by J. Block and S. Weinberger.