Limits of almost homogeneous spaces and their fundamental groups (Q6594549)

A sequence \(X_n\) of proper geodesic spaces is said to be a sequence of almost homogeneous spaces if each of them admits a discrete group of isometries such that the diameters of the quotients converge to zero. Note that this condition is not automatically satisfied if the spaces \(X_n\) are homogeneous. The paper deals with non-compact Gromov-Hausdorff limits of such sequences. More precisely, one has to use pointed spaces and convergence has to be in the pointed Gromov-Hausdorff sense. It is shownt that in this situation, the limit \(X\) is a nilpotent group equipped with an invariant metric. If \(X\) is moreover semi-locally simply connected, then \(X\) is a Lie group and its fundamental group \(\pi_1X\) is a subgroup of some quotient of \(\pi_1X_n\) if \(n\) is large enough. Because of the solution to Hilbert's fifth problem, the assumption of semi-local simple connectedness can be replaced by finite dimensionality. An example is given which shows that the assertion about fundamental groups may fail for ordinary sequences of homogeneous spaces.