Poly-\(\mathbb{Z}\) group actions on Kirchberg algebras. II (Q2030398)

This article classifies outer group actions of certain torsion-free amenable groups on Kirchberg algebras up to cocycle conjugacy. A group \(G\) is allowed if it is a poly-\(\mathbb{Z}\) group, that is, it has a subnormal series of subgroups with all subquotients isomorphic to the group \(\mathbb{Z}\) of integers. The Kirchberg algebras on which actions are classified are the simple, purely infinite, separable, nuclear \(C^*\)-algebras. Kirchberg showed that any KK-equivalence between two such algebras lifts to a stable isomorphism. Assuming the Universal Coefficient Theorem, any isomorphism on \(K\)-theory lifts to a stable isomorphism of the \(C^*\)-algebras. For unital Kirchberg algebras, the classification also involves the class of the unit. This article classifies actions of \(G\) on \(A\) if \(A\) is a stable or a unital Kirchberg algebra. The classification is topological, through homotopy classes of continuous maps from the classifying space \(BG\) of the group \(G\) to the classifying space of the automorphism group of \(A\). Equivalently, it uses locally trivial bundles of \(C^*\)-algebras over \(BG\) with fibre \(A\). Let \(EG\) be the total space of the universal \(G\)-principal bundle over \(BG\). Given an outer group action \(\alpha\colon G\to \mathrm{Aut}(A)\), the associated bundle is \(\mathcal{P}_\alpha = (EG \times A)/G\) for the diagonal action of \(G\) on \(EG\times A\). The authors conjecture in this article that for any torsionfree, amenable, countable discrete group \(G\) and any stable Kirchberg algebra \(A\), the map sending \(\alpha\) to \(\mathcal{P}_\alpha\) induces a bijection between cocycle conjugacy classes of outer \(G\)-actions on \(A\) and isomorphism classes of locally trivial bundles over \(BG\) with fibre \(A\). This conjecture is proven here if \(G\) is a poly-\(\mathbb{Z}\) group. The surjectivity of this map has recently been proven by the reviewer (see Theorem 1.2 in the paper). This alternative method also reformulates the conjecture made here. Namely, the conjecture is equivalent to the statement that two outer \(G\)-actions on stable Kirchberg algebras are cocycle conjugate if they are \(\mathrm{KK}^G\)-equivalent. For actions on unital Kirchberg algebras, a weaker conjecture is formulated and proven for poly-\(\mathbb{Z}\)-groups. It is shown that the construction above gives a bijection if \(A\) is the Cuntz algebra~\(\mathcal{O}_{m+1}\) and the cohomology of the poly-\(\mathbb{Z}\)-group \(G\) has no \(m\)-torsion (see Theorem~1.7). A key proof technique in the article is that, in some situations, homotopy fixed points are homotopic to honest fixed points. The article proves some theorems about deformations of homotopy fixed points and vanishing of certain cohomology groups based on this idea. For Part I, see [the authors, Int. Math. Res. Not. 2021, No. 16, 12077--12154 (2021; Zbl 1490.46067)].