The algebraic theory of the fundamental germ (Q2507556)

The author develops the theory of laminations, that is, families of manifolds bounded by a transversal topology prescribed locally by a topological space parameterizing the families. His purpose is to construct for such a lamination \(\mathcal{L}\) the fundamental germ \([[\pi]]_1(\mathcal{L},x)\) generalizing the fundamental group \(\pi_1\) for a manifold (a lamination with one leaf). In this case the fundamental germ is equal to the nonstandard version (``nonstandard completion'') of \(\pi_1(M,x),\) the group of tail equivalence classes of all sequences in \(\pi_1(M,x).\) However, in general, the fundamental germ is not a group. The paper is organized as follows. The first two sections contain basic notions and results from nonstandard analysis [\textit{A. Robinson}, ``Non-standard analysis'' (1996; Zbl 0843.26012)], the theory of foliations [\textit{A. Candel, L. Conlon}, Foliations I. Grad. Stud. Math. 23 (AMS) (2000; Zbl 0936.57001)] and laminations associated with group actions [\textit{É. Ghys}, in: Dynamique et géométrie complexes. Panor. Synth. 8, 49--95 (1999; Zbl 1018.37028)], etc. Then the author introduces a notion of fundamental germ and investigates its properties for suspensions and quasisuspensions, involving the case of manifolds, solenoids, Reeb foliation, linear foliations of tori, Sullivan solenoid, a double coset foliation, etc. In conclusion he proves the functoriality of the fundamental germ in the category of laminations and considers some applications to the covering space theory.