Connection matrices in combinatorial topological dynamics (Q6980106)

Connection matrix theory (to which the authors have made significant contributions) may be seen as a generalization of parts of Morse theory, growing from Conley's approach to studying dynamical systems. The theory can be used to exhibit heteroclinic connections which in classical Morse theory arise from studying critical points and the gradient vector field of a Morse function on a smooth manifold; in contrast connection matrix theory may be used in the setting of Conley index theory, where the smooth manifold is replaced by a topological space, the gradient vector field is replaced by the flow of a dynamical system, the Morse function is replaced by a so-called Morse decomposition, and the critical points are replaced by Morse sets. This short book brings together a coherent introduction to the theory of connection matrices and provides an account of how connection matrix theory may be brought to bear on the combinatorial setting of multi-vector fields on Lefschetz complexes. The former aspect is particularly welcome as the theory is scattered across diverse research papers taking different points of view. The latter aspect is novel and entails developing new machinery including connection matrices on posets and multiple connection matrices. The book is sophisticated and develops ideas quickly, but is in principle self-contained and able to carry a reader to research frontiers.\N\NAfter a brief introduction, Chapter~2 provides an overview illuminated by numerous examples without details of the combinatorial theory of connection matrices, and Chapter~3 introduces the main definitions and background ideas from algebra and topology. Chapter~4 starts the real technical work with the development of poset graded and poset filtered chain complexes, which are then used to introduce the algebraic connection matrix in Chapter~5. With these ideas to hand, the remaining three chapters apply them to various settings including the dynamics of combinatorial multivector fields and gradient vector field settings in which the associated connection matrix is uniquely determined. The book is carefully and precisely written, and despite its brevity contains clear motivation and conceptual discussions and examples to support understanding alongside the technical developments.