A generalization of Milnor's \(\mu\)-invariants to higher-dimensional link maps (Q2565072)

A link map is a map from a disjoint union of spheres into Euclidean space such that the images of the different spheres are disjoint. A link homotopy is a continuous family of such maps. The notion of link homotopy was introduced by John Milnor in 1954. Milnor constructed a collection of link homotopy invariants for classical links (one-dimensional links in \({\mathbb{R}}^3\)), the \(\bar\mu\)-invariants with distinct indices, and showed that they were sufficient to tell whether a link was homotopically trivial. Much more recently Habegger and Lin have given a complete and effective homotopy classification of classical links. The study of link maps and homotopy in higher dimensions was initiated by Massey-Rolfsen in 1985 and, since then, this has been an active subject, combining geometric methods and homotopy theory. The author of the present paper has been one of the most active in this area. In 1985 the author defined a fundamental collection of link homotopy invariants (\(\mu\)-invariants) for a class of higher-dimensional link maps (\(\kappa\)-Brunnian), which take values in the stable homotopy groups of spheres (additivity properties then enable this invariant to formally be defined for all higher-dimensional links if the components all have codimension at least two.) This construction involved first using the Pontryagin construction on an associated map into a configuration space to produce a non-spherical link and then taking a generalized linking invariant -- also using the Pontryagin construction. The aim of the present paper is to give a more direct geometric description of this invariant when the link map is sufficiently nice (projectible). This description is then used to derive several facts about the \(\mu\)-invariant. For example it is shown that, for almost-trivial classical links in 3-space, the \(\mu\)-invariants coincide with Milnor's homotopy \(\bar\mu\)-invariants and for higher-dimensional links it is the suspension of certain invariants defined by Turaev for imbedded links. In another application, it is shown that the \(\mu\)-invariants are preserved under the Nezhinskij suspension of \(\kappa\)-Brunnian link ma.