Uncountable groups and the geometry of inverse limits of coverings (Q2049884)

In this paper the authors develop a new approach to the study of uncountable fundamental groups by using Hurewicz fibrations with the unique path-lifting property (lifting spaces for short) as a replacement for covering spaces. Hurewicz fibrations with the unique path-lifting property were introduced by \textit{E. H. Spanier} [Algebraic topology. New York: Springer-Verlag (1966; Zbl 0477.55001)]. The main advantage of lifting spaces over covering spaces is that the former are closed with respect to composition and arbitrary inverse limits. Most notably, the inverse limit of a sequence of covering spaces over \(X\) is always a lifting space over \(X\). This is a geometric consequence of the fact that the fundamental group of the base is countable while the fibre of the lifting projection is uncountable. However, if \(X\) is not semilocally simply-connected, then its fundamental group is uncountable by Shelah's theorem [\textit{S. Shelah}, Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 103, No. 2, 627--632 (1988; Zbl 0661.55012)] and the limit space may or may not be path-connected, depending on the interplay between \(\pi_1(X)\) and the sequence of subgroups corresponding to the coverings in the inverse sequence. It is known that the path-connectivity of the inverse limit can be expressed by means of the derived inverse limit functor, \(\underleftarrow{\lim}^1\), which is, however, notoriously difficult to compute when the fundamental group, \(\pi_1(X)\), is uncountable. To circumvent this difficulty, the authors express the set of path-components of the inverse limit \(X\) of a sequence of covering spaces in terms of the functors \(\underleftarrow{\lim}^1\) and \(\underleftarrow{\lim}^1\) applied to sequences of countable groups arising from polyhedral approximations of \(X\). A consequence of their computation is that path-connectedness of a lifting space, \(\tilde{X}\), implies that \(\pi_1(\tilde{X})\) supplements \(\pi_1(X)\) in \(\check{\pi}_1(X)\) where \(\check{\pi}_1(X)\) is the inverse limit of fundamental groups of polyhedral approximations of \(X\). As an application they show that \(\mathcal{G}. \mathrm{Ker}_{\mathbb{Z}}(\hat{F}) = \hat{F} \neq \mathcal{G}. \mathrm{Ker}_{B(1,n)}(\hat{F})\), where \(\hat{F}\) is the canonical inverse limit of finite rank free groups, \(\mathcal{G}\) is the fundamental group of the Hawaiian Earring, \(B(1, n)\) is the Baumslag-Solitar group, and \(\mathrm{Ker}_A(\hat{F})\) is the intersection of kernels of homomorphisms from \(\hat{F}\) to \(A\).