Long colimits of topological groups. I. Continuous maps and homeomorphisms (Q2291587)

Given a directed family \(\{G_\alpha\}_{\alpha \in {\mathbb I}}\) of topological groups with closed embeddings as bonding maps, their union \(G=\bigcup_{\alpha \in {\mathbb I}}G_\alpha\) can be endowed with two topologies, the colimit space topology defined as the finest topology \({\mathcal T}\) making each map \(G_\alpha \rightarrow G\) continuous, and the colimit group topology defined as the finest group topology \({\mathcal A}\) making each map \(G_\alpha\rightarrow G\) continuous. The former topology is always finer than the latter, which raises the question of when the two topologies coincide. The authors say that \(\{G_\alpha\}_{\alpha \in {\mathbb I}}\) satisfies the algebraic colimit property (ACP) if \({\mathcal T}={\mathcal A}.\) The family \(\{G_\alpha\}_{\alpha \in {\mathbb I}}\) satisfies ACP if and only if \((G,{\mathcal T})\) is a topological group (equivalently, the multiplication \(m:(G,{\mathcal T})\times (G,{\mathcal T})\rightarrow (G,{\mathcal T})\) is continuous). Motivated by the fact that ACP is reasonably well understood for countable families of metrizable groups, the goal of the present investigation is to examine the problem in the context of so-called long families, which are (in an appropriate sense) as far as possible from countable ones. The authors give answers to the question for families of group-valued continuous maps and homeomorphism groups. Additional examples illustrate their theory.