Gerbal central extensions of reductive groups by \(\mathcal{K}_3\) (Q745153)

Let \(\mathcal K_3\) be the Zariski sheaf of third Quillen \(K\)-groups and let \(G\) be a split connected reductive group with a simply-connected derived group over a field \(k\) with the Weyl group \(W\). It is shown that the group of isomorphism classes of central extensions of \(G\) by \(\mathcal K_3\) is isomorphic to the group of \(W\)-invariant \(k^\times\)-valued quadratic forms on the cocharacter lattice \(Y=\mathrm{Hom}(\mathbb{G}_m, T_G)\). Yet another result of the paper is that the group of isomorphism classes of gerbal central extensions of \(G\) by \(B\mathcal K_3\) is isomorphic to the group of \(W\)-invariant integer-valued cubic forms on \(Y\). The main ingredient in the proof is the calculation of cohomology groups \(H^\bullet(B_\bullet G, \mathcal K_3)\) of the classifying space \(B_\bullet G\), which in turn depends on the calculation of cohomology groups \(H^\bullet(G, \mathcal K_3)\). The latter is performed by means of Brylinski-Deligne spectral sequence and is parallel to the computation of \(H^\bullet(G, \mathcal K_2)\) given in \S 4 of [\textit{J.-L. Brylinski} and \textit{P. Deligne}, Publ. Math., Inst. Hautes Étud. Sci. 94, 5--85 (2001; Zbl 1093.20027)].