Lecture notes on trisections and cohomology (Q6165134)

Every closed, oriented, connected 4-manifold $X$ admits a trisection, which, roughly speaking, is a decomposition $X=X_1\cup X_2\cup X_3$ into $4$-dimensional handlebodies intersecting pairwise in $3$-dimensional handlebodies, and such that the triple intersection is a closed oriented 2-dimensional surface [\textit{D. T. Gay} and \textit{R. Kirby}, Geom. Topol. 20, No. 6, 3097--3132 (2016; Zbl 1372.57033)]. Reinterpreting the work of [\textit{P. Feller} et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 115, No. 43, 10869--10874 (2018; Zbl 1421.57028)] and [\textit{V. Florens} and \textit{D. Moussard}, Can. J. Math. 74, No. 2, 527--549 (2022; Zbl 1494.57031)] in terms of Čech cohomology of presheaves on $X$, these notes show that such a trisection of $X$ can be used to compute the singular/de Rham cohomology of $X$ via the Čech cohomology of an open cover $\mathcal T$ of $X$ obtained by slightly enlarging the $X_i$'s. In particular, if $\mathcal{C}^i$ (resp. $\mathcal{DR}^i$) is the presheaf on $X$ given by \[ \mathcal{C}^i(U):=H^i(U,\mathbb{Z})\quad \text{(resp. }\mathcal{DR}^i(U):=H^i_{DR}(U,\mathbb{R})), \] then \[ H^2(X,\mathbb Z)\cong \check{H}^1(\mathcal{T},\mathcal{C}^1)\quad\text{ (resp. } H^2_{DR}(X,\mathbb{R})\cong \check{H}^1(\mathcal{T},\mathcal{DR}^1)). \] Hence, by analogy with Hodge theory, the elements in the second singular/de Rham cohomology groups are interpreted as $(1,1)$ classes in the notes. Since complex line bundles on $X$ up to isomorphism are in one-to-one correspondence with elements of $H^2(X,\mathbb Z)$, the author uses the previous interpretation via Čech cohomology to explicitly describe the line bundle (via transition functions) associated to each $(1,1)$ class and vice versa. Almost-complex structures on the spine of a trisection and $\mathrm{Spin}^{\mathbb C}$-structures on $X$ are also discussed in terms of the trisection. The proofs in the notes contain numerous exercises for the reader. For the entire collection see [Zbl 1515.57005].