Equivariant path fields on topological manifolds

Abstract: A classical theorem of H. Hopf asserts that a closed connected smooth manifold admits a nowhere vanishing vector field if and only if its Euler characteristic is zero. R. Brown generalized Hopf's result to topological manifolds, replacing vector fields with path fields. In this note, we give an equivariant analog of Brown's theorem for locally smooth

G

-manifolds where

G

is a finite group.

Review text

\textit{R. F. Brown} [Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 118, 180--191 (1965; Zbl 0129.39302)] showed that a compact topological manifold admits a non-singular path field if and only if its Euler characteristic is zero. This paper shows an analogous theorem for topological manifolds with a locally smooth \(G\)-action. Specifically it is shown that if \(G\) is a finite group, \(M\) a compact locally smooth \(G\)-space, then there exists a \(G\)-path field on \(M\) having at most one singular orbit in the closure of each component of \(M_{H}\). Moreover \(M\) admits a non-singular \(G\)-path field if and only if \(|\chi|(M_{H}) = 0\), for all \(H \leq G\). Here \(|\chi|(M_{H}) = \sum |\chi(C)|\) where \(C\) ranges over the components of \(M_{H}\).

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