Lower bounds for topological complexity

DOI10.1016/J.TOPOL.2013.03.012MaRDI QIDQ390821zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Publication date 9 January 2014

Published in Topology and its Applications (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/1110.6876

Fibrewise Lusternik-Schnirelmann category.Topological complexity

Lyusternik-Shnirel'man category of a space, topological complexity à la Farber, topological robotics (topological aspects) (55M30) Fibrewise topology (55R70)

Abstract: We introduce fibrewise Whitehead- and fibrewise Ganea definitions of monoidal topological complexity. We then define several lower bounds for the topological complexity, which improve on the standard lower bound in terms of nilpotency of the cohomology ring. The relationships between these lower bounds are studied.

Review text

For a topological space \(X\) one defines the notion of topological complexity \(\text{{TC}}(X)\) as the least integer \(n\) such that \(X\times X\) admits an open cover \(U_1\cup \dots \cup U_n=X\times X\) with the property that over each \(U_j\) there is a continuous section \(s_j: U_j\to X^I\) of the path fibration \(X^I\to X\times X\). This notion was introduced in [\textit{M. Farber}, Discrete Comput. Geom. 29, No. 2, 211-221 (2003; Zbl 1038.68130)], it was motivated by the motion planning problem of robotics.NEWLINENEWLINEA monoidal version \(\text{TC}^M(X)\) of this notion was introduced by \textit{N. Iwase} and \textit{M. Sakai} in [Topology Appl. 157, No. 1, 10--21 (2010; Zbl 1192.55002), ibid. 159, No. 10-11, 2810--2813 (2012; Zbl 1243.55002)] here \(\text{TC}^M(X)\) denotes the minimal integer \(m\) such that there is an open cover \(V_1\cup \dots \cup V_m=X\times X\) such that each \(V_j\) contains the diagonal \(\Delta(X) \subset X\times X\) and there is a continuous section \(s_j: V_j\to X^I\) of the path fibration \(X^I\to X\times X\) such that \(s_j(x,x)\) is the constant path at \(x\) for any point \(x\in X\). It is known that \(\text{TC}(X)\leq \text{TC}^M(X)\leq \text{TC}(X)+1\) and Iwase and Sakai conjectured that \(\text{TC}^M(X)= \text{TC}(X)\) for any space \(X\).NEWLINENEWLINEThe authors study several variations of the notion of monoidal topological complexity \(\text{TC}^M(X)\) in the spirit of Ganea and Whitehead. They also prove inequalities for various versions of the topological complexity. Among the inequalities established in the paper are NEWLINE\[NEWLINE\text{nil}_R(X) \leq \sigma\text{{TC}}(X) \leq w\text{TC}_G(X) \leq \text{TC}^M(X),NEWLINE\]NEWLINE NEWLINE\[NEWLINE\text{nil}_R(X)\leq \text{{conil}}_{\text{TC}}(X) \leq w\text{TC}(X) \leq w\text{TC}_G(X) \leq \text{TC}^M(X).NEWLINE\]NEWLINE Moreover, if the ring \(R\) is a field, \(R=k\), then NEWLINE\[NEWLINE\text{nil}_k(X) \leq e_k^{\text{TC}}(X) \leq \sigma \text{{TC}}(X)NEWLINE\]NEWLINE where \(e_k^{\text{TC}}(X)\) is an analogue of the Toomer invariant. Proposition 8 of the paper under review (stating the inequality \(\text{{TC}}(X) \geq \text{{nil}}_R(X)\)) is closely related to Corollary 4.40 from the book [\textit{M. Farber}, Invitation to topological robotics. Zurich Lectures in Advanced Mathematics. Zürich: European Mathematical Society (EMS) (2008; Zbl 1148.55011)].

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