A description of the fundamental group in terms of commutators and closure operators (Q456857)

\textit{G. Janelidze} [Appl. Categ. Struct. 16, No. 6, 653--668 (2008; Zbl 1226.18003)] explained the connection between the Hopf formula (which gives the homology of an object as a quotient of commutators) and the Galois group of an object, which consists of the ``loops with base-point \(0\)'' in the Galois groupoid of a weakly universal normal extension of this object. In the present article, the authors make use of the Galois group (the fundamental group) to obtain Hopf formulae in situations beyond the well-known case of a semi-abelian category with a chosen Birkhoff subcategory. Using homological closure operators and abstract commutators, they examine a composite adjunction (of which the left adjoint plays the role of functor of coefficients): \(\mathcal{B}\) is a Birkhoff subcategory of a semi-abelian category \(\mathcal{A}\), and \(\mathcal{F}\) is a torsion-free subcategory of \(\mathcal{B}\) such that the reflector is protoadditive, which means that it preserves split short exact sequences. The thus obtained Hopf formula, which characterises the fundamental group, contains abstract commutators (which come from the reflection of \(\mathcal{A}\) to \(\mathcal{B}\)) and closure operators (which come from the reflection of \(\mathcal{B}\) to \(\mathcal{F}\)). After explaining the general theory, the authors consider several concrete examples: groups with coefficients in torsion-free abelian groups, rings with coefficients in commutative rings without nilpotent elements, compact groups with coefficients in abelian profinite groups, and simplicial loops with coefficients in groups.