When is a local homeomorphism a semicovering map? (Q1688349)

Recently, \textit{J. Brazas} [Homology Homotopy Appl. 14, No. 1, 33--63 (2012; Zbl 1244.57010)] introduced the notion of a semicovering map as a local homeomorphism with continuous lifting of paths and homotopies. Every covering map is a semicovering map and every semicovering map is a local homeomorphism. In this paper the authors are interested in the converse by studying local homeomorphisms \(p:\widetilde{X}\rightarrow X\), where \(\widetilde{X}\) is a path-connected space and \(p\) is a surjection. Firstly, using different methods they give a new proof that a map \(p\) is a semicovering map if and only if it is a local homeomorphism with unique path lifting and path lifting properties. Then they exhibit some interesting and rather simple examples of local homeomorphisms which are not semicovering maps and an example of an infinite-sheeted semicovering map which is not a covering map. Now the authors are concerned with finding some sufficient conditions for positive answers and the following results are obtained. A local homeomorphism \(p:\widetilde{X} \rightarrow X\) from a Hausdorff space \(\widetilde{X}\) is a semicovering map if \(X\) is a sequential compact space or if \(p\) is closed. On the other hand, if \(p:\widetilde{X}\rightarrow X\) is a finite-sheeted semicovering map from a Hausdorff space \(\widetilde{X}\), then \(f\) is a finite-sheeted covering map. Consequently, every local homeomorphism from a sequential compact Hausdorff space with finite fiber is a finite-sheeted covering map.