A stable range description of the space of link maps (Q982414)

The work under review studies some homotopy properties of the space of link maps. More precisely, given three manifolds \(P\), \(Q\) and \(N\), of dimensions \(p\), \(q\) and \(n\), respectively, let \(\text{Link}(P, Q; N)\) be the space of smooth maps from the disjoint union \(P \cup Q\) to \(N\) such that the images of \(P\) and \(Q\) are disjoint. The main goal of the paper is to show that a certain ``linking number'' map \[ \ell: \text{hofiber}_{(f_1, g_1)}(\mathbb M-\mathbb B \to \mathbb M) \to \Omega Q_+^{TN-(TP \oplus TQ)}\text{holim}(P \overset{f_1} \rightarrow N \overset{g_1} \leftarrow Q) \] is \((2(n-p-q)-3)\)-connected, where \(\mathbb M=\text{Map}(P,N) \times \text{Map}(Q, N)\) and \(\mathbb B\) is the complement of the link maps in \( \mathbb M\). The authors provide in section 2 a commutative diagram, from which the result follows. One relevant ingredient is the use of a subset \(\mathbb V\) of \(\mathbb B\) called ``very bad'' maps. Among the many maps of the main diagram, the crucial and most delicate point is the calculation of the connectivity of the maps \[ \Sigma \text{\,hofiber}(\mathbb M-\mathbb B \to \mathbb M - \mathbb V) \overset{G} \Sigma \text{\,hofiber}(\mathbb M-\mathbb {B} \mathbb M) \] and \[ Q_+^{TN-(TP \oplus TQ)} \text{\,hofiber}(\mathbb B-\mathbb V \to \mathbb M) \overset{D} \rightarrow Q_+^{TN-(TP \oplus TQ)} \text{\,holim}(P \overset{f_1} \rightarrow N \overset{g_1} \leftarrow Q), \] which is \((2(n-p-q)-1)\). This is obtained in section 3. In the last section, section 4, the authors show the following general result, which is also used for the diagram: If \(Y\) is a smooth submanifold of \(X\) and also a closed subset, then the suspension of the homotopy fiber of the inclusion \(X-Y \to X\) is equivalent to the Thom space, over the homotopy fiber of \(Y \to X\), of the normal bundle of \(Y\) in \(X\).