Homotopy

by Stefan Schwede (Author)
Equivariant homotopy theory started from geometrically motivated questions about symmetries of manifolds. Several important equivariant phenomena occur not just for a particular group, but in a uniform way for all groups

Topology occupies a central position in the mathematics of today. One of the most useful ideas to be introduced in the past sixty years is the concept of fibre bundle, which provides an appropriate framework for studying differential geometry and much else. Fibre bundles are examples of the kind of structures studied in fibrewise topology. Just as homotopy theory arises from topology, so fibrewise homotopy the­ ory arises from fibrewise topology.

Topology occupies a central position in the mathematics of today. One of the most useful ideas to be introduced in the past sixty years is the concept of fibre bundle, which provides an appropriate framework for studying differential geometry and much else. Fibre bundles are examples of the kind of structures studied in fibrewise topology. Just as homotopy theory arises from topology, so fibrewise homotopy the­ ory arises from fibrewise topology.

The most important invariant of a topological space is its fundamental group. When this is trivial, the resulting homotopy theory is well researched and familiar. In the general case, however, homotopy theory over nontrivial fundamental groups is much more problematic and far less well understood.