Bookmark and Share

Department of

Mathematics and Computer Science

Title

The Multiplicativity of Fixed-Point Invariants

Event Start DateWednesday, February 15, 2012
Serra Hall, Room 128
Event Start Time12:30 pm - 1:00 pm
CostCost: free
Message

The Multiplicativity of Fixed-point Invariants
Presented by Professor Mike Shulman, University of California, San Diego

Audience: Faculty

Abstract
The Lefschetz number of a continuous map is a classical invariant containing information about fixed points. It admits both an explicit geometrical description and an abstract description as a "categorical trace". The former is good for hands-on computations and for extracting concrete information, while the latter is good for proving general theorems. Such theorems include additivity and multiplicativity formulas for quotients and fiber bundles, which allow us to put together many easy calculations to achieve difficult ones.

The usual abstract framework of categorical trace is adequate for many theorems, but it fails to imply a very good multiplicativity theorem for fiber bundles. I will explain how the more general framework of "bicategorical traces" introduced by Kate Ponto solves this problem, resulting in a very general multiplicativity formula that subsumes all others. It also yields a new, abstract proof of the additivity theorem for quotients.

ContactAmy Prout | aprout@sandiego.edu | 619-260-4706