Operations on stable moduli spaces

Infinite loop spaces (55P47) Homology of classifying spaces and characteristic classes in algebraic topology (55R40) Specialized structures on manifolds (spin manifolds, framed manifolds, etc.) (57R15) Other types of cobordism (57R90) Topological properties of groups of homeomorphisms or diffeomorphisms (57S05)

Abstract: We construct certain operations on stable moduli spaces and use them to compare cohomology of moduli spaces of closed manifolds with tangential structure. We obtain isomorphisms in a stable range provided the

p

-adic valuation of the Euler characteristics agree, for all primes

p

not invertible in the coefficients for cohomology.

Review text

Quillen was the first to note the phenomenon of homological stability for groups [unpublished, 1971], and the topological version, due to \textit{G. Segal} [Invent. Math. 21, 213--221 (1973; Zbl 0267.55020)], was applied by Harer to moduli spaces of surfaces in [\textit{J. L. Harer}, Ann. Math. (2) 121, 215--249 (1985; Zbl 0579.57005)]. The authors have studied moduli spaces of higher dimensional manifolds in a series of papers, starting with [\textit{S. Galatius} and \textit{O. Randal-Williams}, Geom. Topol. 14, No. 3, 1243--1302 (2010; Zbl 1205.55007)] and continuing with [\textit{S. Galatius} and \textit{O. Randal-Williams}, J. Am. Math. Soc. 31, No. 1, 215--264 (2018; Zbl 1395.57044); Ann. Math. (2) 186, No. 1, 127--204 (2017; Zbl 1412.57026)]. See also their survey [\textit{O. Randal-Williams} and \textit{S. Galatius}, ``Moduli spaces of manifolds: a user's guide, in: Handbook of homotopy theory. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press. 43 p. (2020; Zbl 1476.57058)]. The question addressed in this paper is to what extent the stabilization is topological -- that is, coming from a map between the moduli space constructed by a topological operation on the manifolds under consideration (as is the case with surfaces, where one takes the connected sum with a torus to increase genus). The authors consider the moduli space \(\mathcal{M}(W)\) of fiber bundles with fiber a given smooth closed \(d\)-manifold \(W\) (that is, \(B\mathrm{Diff}(W)\)), when \(d=2n\), under stable diffeomorphims (defined by taking connected sums with copies of \(S^{n}\times S^{n}\)). More generally, they consider moduli spaces \(\mathcal{M}^{\Lambda}(W,\lambda)\) of manifolds \(W\) with \(\Lambda\)-structures \(\lambda:\mathrm{Fr}(TW)\to\Lambda\) on their framed tangent bundles (for a suitable space \(\Lambda\)). Their main theorem states that for any abelian group \(A\), there is a canonical isomorphism \(H^{i}(\mathcal{M}^{\Lambda}(W,\lambda);A)\cong H^{i}(\mathcal{M}^{\Lambda}(W',\lambda');A)\) (induced by a zigzag of maps) whenever \(W\) and \(W'\) are simply connected, \(d=2n>4\), and \(i\) is small compared to the (non-zero) Euler characteristics \(\chi(W)\) and \(\chi(W')\) (which must have the same \(p\)-adic valuation for all primes \(p\) not invertible in \(\mathrm{End}_{\mathbb Z}(A)\)). As an example, they deduce that \(H^{i}(\mathcal{M}(W);{\mathbb Z}_{(p)})\cong H^{i}(\mathcal{M}(W');{\mathbb Z}_{(p)})\) for small \(i\), if \(\chi(W)\) and \(\chi(W')\) have the same \(p\)-adic valuation. In the works cited above the authors had previously produced maps \(\mathcal{M}^{\Lambda}(W,\lambda)\to(\Omega^{\infty}MT\Theta)/\!/\mathrm{hAut}(u)\) which induce isomorphisms in homology in a range, where \(u:\Theta\to\Lambda\) is a cofibrant \(\mathrm{GL}_{d}({\mathbb R})\)-equivariant fibration and \(MT\Theta\) is the Thom spectrum of the inverse of the corresponding \({\mathbb R}^{d}\)-bundle on the Borel construction \(B=\Theta/\!/\mathrm{GL}_{d}({\mathbb R})\). The main theorem here is then proved by constructing certain operations \(\psi^{q}:\Omega_{k}^{\infty}MT\Theta\to\Omega_{qk}^{\infty}MT\Theta\), coming from self-maps of the Thom spectra, for any \(q,k\in{\mathbb Z}\) (with \(2\) inverted when \(q=2\)). Here \(\Omega_{k}^{\infty}MT\Theta\) is a union of certain path components.

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