The fine structure of the Kasparov groups. I: Continuity of the KK-pairing (Q5949992)

The issue of this paper is to equip Kasparov's bivariant \(K\)-groups \(KK(A,B)\), \(A,B\;C^*\)-algebras, with canonical topologies and to study the behaviour of these topologies with respect to the product operations in \(KK\)-theory. According to Cuntz, there is a canonical isomorphism \(KK(A,B) \simeq [qA,{\mathcal K}\otimes B]\), which identifies the bivariant \(K\)-groups of a pair \((A,B)\) of \(C^*\)-algebras with the set of homotopy classes of \(C^*\)-algebra homomorphisms between certain universal \(C^*\)-algebras attached to \((A,B)\). This enables the author to introduce a topology on bivariant \(K\)-groups by declaring the Cuntz isomorphism to be a homeomorphism onto \([qA,{\mathcal K}\otimes B]\) equipped with the quotient of the compact-open topology on \(\text{Mor}_{C^*} (qA, {\mathcal K}\otimes B)\). The author introduces two further topologies on bivariant \(K\)-groups. One is based on the interpretation of \(KK^1\) in terms of completely positively split extensions. It is given by the natural topology on the associated space of Busby invariants. The third topology relies on the description of \(KK^1\) in terms of homotopy classes of homomorphisms between universal algebras by Zekri, which is similar to the one given by Cuntz in the even case. The author then shows that the Kasparov product is separately continuous in the Cuntz topology. If the algebras occuring in the first variable of the \(KK\)-groups happen to be \(K\)-nuclear, then all the mentioned topologies are shown to coincide and it is proved that in this case the Kasparov pairing is in fact jointly continuous.