In mathematics, a circle bundle is a fiber bundle where the fiber is the circle .
Oriented circle bundles are also known as principal U(1)-bundles, or equivalently, as principal SO(2)-bundles. In physics, circle bundles are the natural geometric setting for electromagnetism. A circle bundle is a special case of a sphere bundle.
Circle bundles over surfaces are an important example of 3-manifolds. A more general class of 3-manifolds is Seifert fiber spaces, which may be viewed as a kind of "singular" circle bundle, or as a circle bundle over a two-dimensional orbifold.
The Maxwell equations correspond to an electromagnetic field represented by a 2-form F, with being cohomologous to zero, i.e. exact. In particular, there always exists a 1-form A, the electromagnetic four-potential, (equivalently, the affine connection) such that
Given a circle bundle P over M and its projection
one has the homomorphism
where is the pullback. Each homomorphism corresponds to a Dirac monopole; the integer cohomology groups correspond to the quantization of the electric charge. The Aharonov–Bohm effect can be understood as the holonomy of the connection on the associated line bundle describing the electron wave-function. In essence, the Aharonov–Bohm effect is not a quantum-mechanical effect (contrary to popular belief), as no quantization is involved or required in the construction of the fiber bundles or connections.
The isomorphism classes of principal -bundles over a manifold M are in one-to-one correspondence with the homotopy classes of maps , where is called the classifying space for U(1). Note that is the infinite-dimensional complex projective space, and that it is an example of the Eilenberg–Maclane space Such bundles are classified by an element of the second integral cohomology group of M, since
This isomorphism is realized by the Euler class; equivalently, it is the first Chern class of a smooth complex line bundle (essentially because a circle is homotopically equivalent to , the complex plane with the origin removed; and so a complex line bundle with the zero section removed is homotopically equivalent to a circle bundle.)
A circle bundle is a principal bundle if and only if the associated map is null-homotopic, which is true if and only if the bundle is fibrewise orientable. Thus, for the more general case, where the circle bundle over M might not be orientable, the isomorphism classes are in one-to-one correspondence with the homotopy classes of maps . This follows from the extension of groups, , where .
The above classification only applies to circle bundles in general; the corresponding classification for smooth circle bundles, or, say, the circle bundles with an affine connection requires a more complex cohomology theory. Results include that the smooth circle bundles are classified by the second Deligne cohomology ; circle bundles with an affine connection are classified by while classifies line bundle gerbes.
In mathematics, specifically in homology theory and algebraic topology, cohomology is a general term for a sequence of abelian groups, usually one associated with a topological space, often defined from a cochain complex. Cohomology can be viewed as a method of assigning richer algebraic invariants to a space than homology. Some versions of cohomology arise by dualizing the construction of homology. In other words, cochains are functions on the group of chains in homology theory.
In mathematics, in particular in algebraic topology, differential geometry and algebraic geometry, the Chern classes are characteristic classes associated with complex vector bundles. They have since become fundamental concepts in many branches of mathematics and physics, such as string theory, Chern–Simons theory, knot theory, Gromov–Witten invariants.
In mathematics, the Pontryagin classes, named after Lev Pontryagin, are certain characteristic classes of real vector bundles. The Pontryagin classes lie in cohomology groups with degrees a multiple of four.
In mathematics, particularly algebraic topology, cohomotopy sets are particular contravariant functors from the category of pointed topological spaces and basepoint-preserving continuous maps to the category of sets and functions. They are dual to the homotopy groups, but less studied.
In mathematics, complex projective space is the projective space with respect to the field of complex numbers. By analogy, whereas the points of a real projective space label the lines through the origin of a real Euclidean space, the points of a complex projective space label the complex lines through the origin of a complex Euclidean space (see below for an intuitive account). Formally, a complex projective space is the space of complex lines through the origin of an (n+1)-dimensional complex vector space. The space is denoted variously as P(Cn+1), Pn(C) or CPn. When n = 1, the complex projective space CP1 is the Riemann sphere, and when n = 2, CP2 is the complex projective plane (see there for a more elementary discussion).
In mathematics, the Bott periodicity theorem describes a periodicity in the homotopy groups of classical groups, discovered by Raoul Bott, which proved to be of foundational significance for much further research, in particular in K-theory of stable complex vector bundles, as well as the stable homotopy groups of spheres. Bott periodicity can be formulated in numerous ways, with the periodicity in question always appearing as a period-2 phenomenon, with respect to dimension, for the theory associated to the unitary group. See for example topological K-theory.
In mathematics, a gerbe is a construct in homological algebra and topology. Gerbes were introduced by Jean Giraud following ideas of Alexandre Grothendieck as a tool for non-commutative cohomology in degree 2. They can be seen as an analogue of fibre bundles where the fibre is the classifying stack of a group. Gerbes provide a convenient, if highly abstract, language for dealing with many types of deformation questions especially in modern algebraic geometry. In addition, special cases of gerbes have been used more recently in differential topology and differential geometry to give alternative descriptions to certain cohomology classes and additional structures attached to them.
In mathematics, in particular in algebraic topology and differential geometry, the Stiefel–Whitney classes are a set of topological invariants of a real vector bundle that describe the obstructions to constructing everywhere independent sets of sections of the vector bundle. Stiefel–Whitney classes are indexed from 0 to n, where n is the rank of the vector bundle. If the Stiefel–Whitney class of index i is nonzero, then there cannot exist everywhere linearly independent sections of the vector bundle. A nonzero nth Stiefel–Whitney class indicates that every section of the bundle must vanish at some point. A nonzero first Stiefel–Whitney class indicates that the vector bundle is not orientable. For example, the first Stiefel–Whitney class of the Möbius strip, as a line bundle over the circle, is not zero, whereas the first Stiefel–Whitney class of the trivial line bundle over the circle, , is zero.
In mathematics, specifically in homotopy theory, a classifying spaceBG of a topological group G is the quotient of a weakly contractible space EG by a proper free action of G. It has the property that any G principal bundle over a paracompact manifold is isomorphic to a pullback of the principal bundle . As explained later, this means that classifying spaces represent a set-valued functor on the homotopy category of topological spaces. The term classifying space can also be used for spaces that represent a set-valued functor on the category of topological spaces, such as Sierpiński space. This notion is generalized by the notion of classifying topos. However, the rest of this article discusses the more commonly used notion of classifying space up to homotopy.
In mathematics, the Chern–Weil homomorphism is a basic construction in Chern–Weil theory that computes topological invariants of vector bundles and principal bundles on a smooth manifold M in terms of connections and curvature representing classes in the de Rham cohomology rings of M. That is, the theory forms a bridge between the areas of algebraic topology and differential geometry. It was developed in the late 1940s by Shiing-Shen Chern and André Weil, in the wake of proofs of the generalized Gauss–Bonnet theorem. This theory was an important step in the theory of characteristic classes.
In mathematics, complex cobordism is a generalized cohomology theory related to cobordism of manifolds. Its spectrum is denoted by MU. It is an exceptionally powerful cohomology theory, but can be quite hard to compute, so often instead of using it directly one uses some slightly weaker theories derived from it, such as Brown–Peterson cohomology or Morava K-theory, that are easier to compute.
In mathematics, specifically algebraic topology, an Eilenberg–MacLane space is a topological space with a single nontrivial homotopy group.
In mathematics, specifically in algebraic geometry, the Grothendieck–Riemann–Roch theorem is a far-reaching result on coherent cohomology. It is a generalisation of the Hirzebruch–Riemann–Roch theorem, about complex manifolds, which is itself a generalisation of the classical Riemann–Roch theorem for line bundles on compact Riemann surfaces.
In mathematics, the exponential sheaf sequence is a fundamental short exact sequence of sheaves used in complex geometry.
In mathematics, the classifying space for the unitary group U(n) is a space BU(n) together with a universal bundle EU(n) such that any hermitian bundle on a paracompact space X is the pull-back of EU(n) by a map X → BU(n) unique up to homotopy.
In differential geometry, a spin structure on an orientable Riemannian manifold (M, g) allows one to define associated spinor bundles, giving rise to the notion of a spinor in differential geometry.
In mathematics, equivariant cohomology is a cohomology theory from algebraic topology which applies to topological spaces with a group action. It can be viewed as a common generalization of group cohomology and an ordinary cohomology theory. Specifically, the equivariant cohomology ring of a space with action of a topological group is defined as the ordinary cohomology ring with coefficient ring of the homotopy quotient :
In mathematics, a complex torus is a particular kind of complex manifold M whose underlying smooth manifold is a torus in the usual sense. Here N must be the even number 2n, where n is the complex dimension of M.
This is a glossary of properties and concepts in algebraic topology in mathematics.
