Topological methods for complex-analytic Brauer groups (Q2488277)

For a topological space \(X\) endowed with a sheaf of rings \({\mathcal O}_X\) one defines the cohomological Brauer group \(\text{Br}'(X)\) and the geometrical one. From the definition one has a canonical inclusion \(\text{Br}(X)\subset \text{Br}'(X)\). A major open problem in the theory of Brauer groups is the question of Grothendieck whether this inclusion is a bijection. The author of the paper under review proves the equality in the following interesting cases. (a) When \(X\) is a connected complex-analytic space whose fundamental group \(\pi_1(X)\) is good (in the sense of Serre) and the subgroup of \(\pi_1(X)\)-invariants in the Pontrjagin dual \(\text{Hom}(\pi_2(X),\mathbb Q/\mathbb Z)\) vanishes, and (b) When \(S\) is a smooth compact surface with \(V\subset S\) a nonempty Zariski open subset, under the same additional assumptions for the fundamental group of \(V\), as in case (1). As a corollary follows the equality of the Brauer groups for complex Lie groups, Hopf manifolds, elliptic surfaces and surfaces of classs VII.