Localization of a topological space

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In mathematics, well-behaved topological spaces can be localized at primes, in a similar way to the localization of a ring at a prime. This construction was described by Dennis Sullivan in 1970 lecture notes that were finally published in ( Sullivan 2005 ).

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The reason to do this was in line with an idea of making topology, more precisely algebraic topology, more geometric. Localization of a space X is a geometric form of the algebraic device of choosing 'coefficients' in order to simplify the algebra, in a given problem. Instead of that, the localization can be applied to the space X, directly, giving a second space Y.

Definitions

We let A be a subring of the rational numbers, and let X be a simply connected CW complex. Then there is a simply connected CW complex Y together with a map from X to Y such that

This space Y is unique up to homotopy equivalence, and is called the localization of X at A.

If A is the localization of Z at a prime p, then the space Y is called the localization of X at p

The map from X to Y induces isomorphisms from the A-localizations of the homology and homotopy groups of X to the homology and homotopy groups of Y.

See also

Category:Localization (mathematics)

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