A refinement of multi-dimensional persistence (Q2479591)

The union of \(\epsilon\)-balls around each point of a point cloud data set \(X\) gives a topological space \(X_\epsilon\) approximating the topology of \(X\). By allowing \(\epsilon\) to grow, one obtains a nested sequence of spaces \(X_\epsilon\subset X_{\epsilon'}\) for any \(\epsilon<\epsilon'\). For \(\epsilon\) small, nothing happens, but as \(\epsilon\) increases, the balls begin to overlap and non-trivial cycles may appear in \(X_\epsilon\), measured by homology. The abstraction of this idea consists of considering the homology of a filtered simplicial complex \((X_n)_{n\geq 0}\). Let \(k\) be a field. The disjoint sum of the \(H_i(X_n,k)\) for \(i\) fixed has a structure of \(k[x]\)-module where the action of \(x\) on each \(H_i(X_n,k)\) is given by the map \(H_i(X_n,k) \rightarrow H_i(X_{n+1},k)\). The classification of \(k[x]\)-modules yields a barcode characterizing how long homology classes persist. This is the idea of persistent homology for one filtration. For the case of several filtrations, the same kind of idea leads to a structure of \(k[x_1,\dots,x_n]\)-module (for \(n\geq 2\)) on a vector space \(M\) graded over \(\mathbb{N}^n\). But the situation is now quite more complicated. The author considers two multisets \(\xi_0\) and \(\xi_1\) which indicate the degrees in \(\mathbb{N}^n\) where homology classes are born and where they die, respectively. There may be many (even uncountably many) non isomorphic modules with the same \(\xi_0\) and \(\xi_1\). These are parametrized by the quotient of a variety by the action of an algebraic group. The multisets \(\xi_0\) and \(\xi_1\) are obtained by computing the \(0\)-th and first Tor modules of \(M\) viewed as a \(k[x_1,\dots,x_n]\)-module. For \(n\geq 2\), the higher Tor modules are nontrivial and are the main object of study of this paper. A geometric interpretation for the higher Tor modules is presented.