LS-category of moment-angle manifolds and higher order Massey products (Q2121273)

The Lyusternik-Schnirelmann category \(\mathrm{cat}(X)\) of a topological space \(X\) is a homotopy invariant used in algebraic topology and dynamical systems. It is defined as the smallest integer \(n\) such that the space \(X\) has an open covering \(\{ U_{i}\}_{i=1}^n\) with the property that each inclusion \(U_{i}\hookrightarrow X\) is nullhomotopic. Let \(K\) be a simplicial complex. The moment-angle complex \({\mathcal{Z}}_K\) is an example of a polyhedral product \((X,A)^K\), where \(X={\mathbb{D}}^2\) is the \(2\)-disk and \(A={\mathbb{S}}^1\) is the circle. The authors first describe filtrations of \(K\) which imply lower bounds for \(\mathrm{cat}({\mathcal{Z}}_K)\). They also detect combinatorial operations on \(K\) which imply upper bounds for \(\mathrm{cat}({\mathcal{Z}}_K)\). As an application of these methods, they characterize \(\mathrm{cat}({\mathcal{Z}}_K)\), where \(K\) is a triangulated \(d\)-manifold, \(d\leq 2\), or a higher-dimensional sphere given via connected sum, join and vertex doubling operations. The authors also use Lyusternik-Schnirelmann categories to give structural results on higher Massey products in \(H^\ast({\mathcal{Z}}_K)\). Applications include calculations of the Lyusternik-Schnirelmann category and description of conditions for vanishing of Massey products for moment-angle manifolds over fullerenes, Pogorelov polytopes and \(k\)-neighborly complexes.