Estimates of covering type and minimal triangulations based on category weight (Q2155617)

The minimal number of vertices in a triangulation of a compact manifold is an important PL-homeomorphic invariant. This invariant is difficult to compute [\textit{W. Kühnel}, Result. Math. 9, 95--106 (1986; Zbl 0552.52003); \textit{S. Klee} and \textit{I. Novik}, IMA Vol. Math. Appl. 159, 653--686 (2016; Zbl 1354.05152)]. Some recent advances are related to this area [\textit{K. Adiprasito}, ``Combinatorial Lefschetz theorems beyond positivity'', Preprint, \url{arXiv:1812.10454}; \textit{W. Kühnel}, loc. cit.]. In this paper, the authors give a new method to estimate the minimal number of vertices in a triangulation of a compact, triangulable space \(X\). Based on Lusternik-Schnirelmann category and the cohomology ring of a space \(X\) [\textit{D. Govc} et al., Discrete Comput. Geom. 63, No. 1, 31--48 (2020; Zbl 1431.55003)], they present an important extension that takes into account the fundamental group of \(X\). They develop several weighted estimates and then apply the method to compute explicit lower bounds of triangulations of some special manifolds. Specifically, first they show that \[ \mathrm{sct}(X)\geq\mathrm{wct}(s;w),\quad \mathrm{ct}(w)\geq\mathrm{swct}(X) \] and then give lower bounds of some special manifolds by calculating \(\mathrm{wct}(s;w)\) and \(\mathrm{swct}(X)\). Here, \(\mathrm{ct}\) denotes the \textit{covering type}, \(\mathrm{sct}\) the \textit{strict covering type}, and \(\mathrm{wct}\) and \(\mathrm{swct}\) are estimates considering a \textit{weight estimator} \(w\), for details see the text. The present study is an interesting topic. It solves an important problem by using novel and innovative methods.