Betti numbers of semialgebraic sets defined by quantifier-free formulae (Q1773889)

This paper is devoted to get a bound for the sum \(b(X)\) of the Betti numbers of a semialgebraic set \(X\). More precisely, the authors prove the following Theorem. If \(X=\bigcup_{i=1}^r\{P_{i1}>0, \ldots, P_{ir_i}>0, Q_i=0\}\) is a semialgebraic set such that \(\deg(P_{ij}),\deg(Q_i)\leq d\) for all \(i,j\), and the number of distinct involved polynomials is \(k\), then \(b(X)\) is less than \(O(k^2d)^n\). This result extends previous well-known results for an algebraic set \(X\subset {\mathbb R}^n\) due to \textit{O. A. Oleinik} and \textit{I. G. Petrovskii} [Izv. Akad. Nauk SSSR, Ser. Mat. 13, 389--402 (1949; Zbl 0035.10204)], \textit{J. Milnor} [Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 15, 275--280 (1964; Zbl 0123.38302)], and \textit{R. Thom} [in: Differ. Combinat. Topology, Sympos. Marston Morse, Princeton, 255--265 (1965; Zbl 0137.42503)] which provide \(d(2d-1)^{n-1}\) as an upper bound for \(b(X)\) (the sum of the Betti numbers of \(X\)), where \(d\) is an upper bound for the degrees of a system of polynomials defining \(X\). It also extends a results of \textit{S. Basu} [Discrete Comput. Geom. 22, No. 1, 1--18 (1999; Zbl 0973.14033)] for basic semialgebraic sets \(X\), which states that \(b(X)\leq O(kd)^n\), where \(k\) is the number of distinct involved polynomials defining \(X\) and \(d\) is an upper bound for their degrees.