Deconstructing Hopf spaces (Q863433)

This paper represents one further step in the programme of understanding larger and larger classes of Hopf spaces (commonly known as \(H\)-spaces) in terms of familiar examples. Perhaps the definitive first step of this programme is \textit{J. R. Hubbuck}'s theorem that a finite, connected, homotopy-commutative \(H\)-space is homotopy equivalent to a product of circles [Topology 8, 119--126 (1969; Zbl 0176.21301)]. In this latest work the authors relax the finiteness condition to include any \(H\)-space whose cohomology is finitely generated as an algebra over the Steenrod algebra. Such a space, if connected (but not necessarily homotopy-commutative), is shown to form the total space of an \(H\)-fibration whose base space is an \(H\)-space with finite mod \(p\) cohomology and whose fibre is a \(p\)-torsion \(H\)-Postnikov piece whose homotopy groups are finite direct sums of copies of cyclic groups \({\mathbb Z}/p^r\) and Prüfer groups \({\mathbb Z}/p^{\infty}\). In the commutative setting this implies that such an \(H\)-space is a product of circles and a connected \(H\)-Postnikov piece.