An additivity theorem for cobordism categories (Q2035039)

The article at hand provides a new tool for studying the classifying spaces of categories, in particular those that behave like cobordism categories. While the classifying space of the cobordism category of smooth manifolds \(\mathrm{Cob}_d\) was computed by [\textit{S. Galatius} et al., Acta Math. 202, No. 2, 195--239 (2009; Zbl 1221.57039)] using a parametrized Pontrjagin-Thom construction, many other cobordism-like categories cannot be studied in such a local manner. The author lists several examples of interest: the h-cobordism category, the category of cobordisms equipped with positive scalar curvature, the cobordism category associated to a Waldhausen category (similar to Quillen's \(Q(\mathcal{C})\)), and the cobordism categories of Poincaré objects that arise in recent work on Hermitian K-theory [\textit{B. Calmès} et al., ``Hermitian K-theory for stable \(\infty\)-categories. I: Foundations'', Preprint, \url{arXiv:2009.07223}]. The main theorem of this article is the eponymous \textit{additivity theorem for cobordism categories}, which allows to construct homotopy pullback squares of classifying spaces, even when the spaces themselves cannot be computed directly. In its simplest form, when applied to ordinary categories, it says: Consider a functor \(P:\mathcal{C} \to \mathcal{D}\) that is both a cartesian and a cocartesian fibration (in the sense of Grothendieck). Then for any functor \(F: \mathcal{D}' \to \mathcal{D}\), the classifying space of the pullback of categories \(\mathcal{D}' \times_{\mathcal{D}} \mathcal{C}\) is homotopy equivalent to the homotopy pullback of classifying spaces \(B(\mathcal{D}') \times_{B(\mathcal{D})}^h B(\mathcal{C})\). To suit a wide range of applications this is proven in three flavours: for quasicategories, for weakly unital semi-Segal spaces, and for weakly unital topological categories. As an application the author reproves the Genauer's fiber-sequence for cobordism categories with horizontal boundaries and the Bökstedt-Madsen delooping of the cobordism category.