Quandle homology groups, their Betti numbers, and virtual knots (Q5931430)

By Matveev, a quandle \(X\) is a groupoid with an operation \(*\) and the axioms: I. Idempotency: for \(\forall a\in X\), \(a*a=a\); II. Right-invertibility: for \(\forall a,b\in X,\) there is \(c\in X\) such that \(a=c*b,\) and III. Self-distributivity: for \(\forall a,b,c\in X,\) we have \((a*b)*c=(a*c)*(b*c).\) A rack is a groupoid with operation that satisfies the axioms (II) and (III). Examples: 1. The trivial quandle is any set \(X\) with operation \(x*y=x\) for \(\forall x,y\in X.\) 2. The dihedral quandle \(R_n\) is the set \(R_n=\{ 0,1,\ldots ,n-1\}\) with operation \(i*j=2j-1.\) For racks or quandles \(X\) there exists the chain complex \(\{C^R_n(X),\partial_n\},\) where \(C^R_n(X)\) is the free abelian group generated by \(n\)-tuples \((x_1, \dots ,x_n)\), \(x_i\in X\), \(i=1,\dots ,n\) and the differential \(\partial_n:C^R_n(X)\to C^R_{n-1}(X)\) defined by the formulas \[ \begin{multlined}\partial_n(x_1,x_2,\dots,x_n)=\\ = \sum_{i=2}^n(-1)^i[(x_1,x_2,\dots ,x_{i-1},x_{i+1},\dots , x_n)-(x_1*x_i,x_2*x_i,\dots, x_{i-1}*x_i,x_{i+1}\dots ,x_n)]\end{multlined} \] for \(n\geq 2\) and \(\partial_n=0\) for \(n\leq 1.\) The sub-complex \(C^D_n(X)\) is generated by \(n\)-tuples \((x_1, \dots ,x_n)\) with \(x_i=x_{i+1}\) for some \(i\in\{1,\dots ,n-1\}\) if \(n\geq 2\); otherwise \(C^D_n(X)=0.\) For an abelian group \(G,\) let \(C^W_*(X,G),C^*_W(X,G)\), \(W=R,D\) be the complexes \(C^W_*(X,G)=C^W_*(X)\otimes G\), \(C^*_W(X,G)= \Hom(C^W_*(X),G)\) and \(C^Q_*(X,G)=C^R_*(X,G)/C^D_*(X,G),\) \(C^*_Q(X,G)=\) \(\Hom (C^Q_*(X),G)\). The rack (quandle, degeneration) homology \(H_n^R(X,G)\) (\(H_n^Q(X,G)\),\break \(H_n^D(X,G)\)) is the homology \(H_n(C_*^R(X,G))\) \((H_n(C_*^Q(X,G)),H_n(C^D_*(X,G)))\) of the corresponding complexes. The Betti number \(\beta_n^W(X)\), \(W=D,R,Q\) is the rank of the homology groups \(H_n^W(X,\mathbb Z).\) Similarly the rack (quandle, degeneration) cohomology is defined. For defined homology and cohomology, the following properties are proved: The short exact sequence of the complexes \(0\to C^D_*(X,G)\to C^R_*(X,G)\to C^Q_*(X,G)\to 0\) generates the long exact sequence of homology groups; the ordinary universal coefficient theorems hold. Examples of the calculations of the homology and cohomology groups for the trivial and dihedral quandle are given. If a quandle \(X\) allows an epimorphism on the trivial quandle with \(m\) elements then the following lower bounds for Betti numbers \(\beta_n^D(X)\geq m^n-m(m-1)^{n-1}\), \(\beta_n^R(X)\geq m^n\), \(\beta_n^Q(X)\geq m(m-1)^{n-1}\) are proved. For dihedral quandles, some specialization of these inequalities is given. For a coloring with elements of a finite quandle \(X\) of all over-arcs of a knot diagram (or a virtual knot diagram) and a quandle 2-cocycle of the \(X\) is defined the state-sum knot (or virtual knot) invariant. This invariant depends only on the cohomology class of the quandle 2-cocycle. The constructed state-sum virtual knot invariant is used for the proof of non-triviality of some rack and quandle cohomology groups.