For an odd prime $p$, we consider free actions of $(\mathbb {Z}_{/{p}})^2$ on $S^{2n-1}\times S^{2n-1}$ given by linear actions of $(\mathbb {Z}_{/{p}})^2$ on $\mathbb {R}^{4n}$. Simple examples include a lens space cross a lens space, but $k$-invariant calculations show that other quotients exist. Using the tools of Postnikov towers and surgery theory, the quotients are classified up to homotopy by the $k$-invariants and up to homeomorphism by the Pontrjagin classes. We will present these results and demonstrate how to calculate the $k$-invariants and the Pontrjagin classes from the rotation numbers.

For a finite group $G$ of not prime power order, Oliver showed that the obstruction for a finite CW-complex $F$ to be the fixed point set of a contractible finite $G$-CW-complex is determined by the Euler characteristic $\chi (F)$. (He also has similar results for compact Lie group actions.) We show that the analogous problem for $F$ to be the fixed point set of a finite $G$-CW-complex of some given homotopy type is still determined by the Euler characteristic. Using trace maps on $K_0$ [2, 7, 18], we also see that there are interesting roles for the fundamental group and the component structure of the fixed point set.

A hyperbolic group G acts by homeomorphisms on its Gromov boundary. We show that if $\partial G$ is a topological n–sphere, the action is topologically stable in the dynamical sense: any nearby action is semi-conjugate to the standard boundary action.

Dold manifolds $P(m,n)$ are certain twisted complex projective space bundles over real projective spaces and serve as generators for the unoriented cobordism algebra of smooth manifolds. The paper investigates the structure of finite groups that act freely on products of Dold manifolds. It is proved that if a finite group G acts freely and $ \mathbb{Z}_2 $ cohomologically trivially on a finite CW-complex homotopy equivalent to ${\prod_{i=1}^{k} P(2m_i,n_i)}$, then $G\cong (\mathbb{Z}_2)^l$ for some $l\leq k$ (see Theorem A for the exact bound). We also determine some bounds in the case when for each i, ni is even and mi is arbitrary. As a consequence, the free rank of symmetry of these manifolds is determined for cohomologically trivial actions.

We give a formulation of a deformation of Dirac operator along orbits of a group action on a possibly noncompact manifold to get an equivariant index and a K-homology cycle representing the index. We apply this framework to noncompact Hamiltonian torus manifolds to define geometric quantization from the viewpoint of index theory. We give two applications. The first one is a proof of a [Q,R]=0 type theorem, which can be regarded as a proof of the Vergne conjecture for abelian case. The other is a Danilov-type formula for toric case in the noncompact setting, which is a localization phenomenon of geometric quantization in the noncompact setting. The proofs are based on the localization of index to lattice points.

Let M be a closed, connected, orientable topological $4$ -manifold, and G be a finite group acting topologically and locally linearly on M. In this paper, we investigate the spectral sequence for the Borel cohomology $H^*_G(M)$ and establish new bounds on the rank of G for homologically trivial actions with discrete singular set.

The space of convex projective structures has been well studied with respect to the topological entropy. But, to better understand the geometry of the structure, we study the entropy of the Sinai–Ruelle–Bowen measure and show that it is a continuous function on the space of strictly convex real projective structures.

We study 2-generated subgroups $\langle f,g\rangle <\operatorname{Homeo}^{+}(I)$ such that $\langle f^{2},g^{2}\rangle$ is isomorphic to Thompson’s group $F$, and such that the supports of $f$ and $g$ form a chain of two intervals. We show that this class contains uncountably many isomorphism types. These include examples with non-abelian free subgroups, examples which do not admit faithful actions by $C^{2}$ diffeomorphisms on 1-manifolds, examples which do not admit faithful actions by $PL$ homeomorphisms on an interval, and examples which are not finitely presented. We thus answer questions due to Brin. We also show that many relatively uncomplicated groups of homeomorphisms can have very complicated square roots, thus establishing the behavior of square roots of $F$ as part of a general phenomenon among subgroups of $\operatorname{Homeo}^{+}(I)$.

The genus spectrum of a finite group G is the set of all g such that G acts faithfully on a compact Riemann surface of genus g. It is an open problem to find a general description of the genus spectrum of the groups in interesting classes, such as the Abelian p-groups. Motivated by earlier work of Talu for odd primes, we develop a general combinatorial method, for arbitrary primes, to obtain a structured description of the so-called reduced genus spectrum of Abelian p-groups, including the reduced minimum genus. In particular, we determine the complete genus spectrum for a large subclass, namely, those having ‘large’ defining invariants. With our method we construct infinitely many counterexamples to a conjecture of Talu, which states that an Abelian p-group is recoverable from its genus spectrum. Finally, we give a series of examples of our method, in the course of which we prove, for example, that almost all elementary Abelian p-groups are uniquely determined by their minimum genus, and that almost all Abelian p-groups of exponent p2 are uniquely determined by their minimum genus and Kulkarni invariant.

We determine the possible $\mathbb{Z}_{2}$-cohomology rings of orbit spaces of free actions of $\mathbb{Z}_{2}$ (or fixed point free involutions) on the Dold manifold $P(1,n)$, where $n$ is an odd natural number.

A fundamental idea in toric topology is that classes of manifolds with well-behaved torus actions (simply, toric spaces) are classified by pairs of simplicial complexes and (non-singular) characteristic maps. In a previous paper, the authors provided a new way to find all characteristic maps on a simplicial complex $K(J)$ obtainable by a sequence of wedgings from $K$.The main idea was that characteristic maps on $K$ theoretically determine all possible characteristic maps on a wedge of $K$.

We further develop our previous work for classification of toric spaces. For a star-shaped simplicial sphere $K$ of dimension $n-1$ with $m$ vertices, the Picard number Pic$(K)$ of $K$ is $m-n$. We call $K$ a seed if $K$ cannot be obtained by wedgings. First, we show that for a fixed positive integer $\ell $, there are at most finitely many seeds of Picard number $\ell $ supporting characteristic maps. As a corollary, the conjecture proposed by V. V. Batyrev in is solved affirmatively.

Secondly, we investigate a systematicmethod to find all characteristic maps on $K(J)$ using combinatorial objects called (realizable) puzzles that only depend on a seed $K$. These two facts lead to a practical way to classify the toric spaces of fixed Picard number.

To any Nash germ invariant under right composition with a linear action of a finite group, we associate its equivariant zeta functions, inspired from motivic zeta functions, using the equivariant virtual Poincaré series as a motivic measure. We show Denef–Loeser formulas for the equivariant zeta functions and prove that they are invariants for equivariant blow-Nash equivalence via equivariant blow-Nash isomorphisms. Equivariant blow-Nash equivalence between invariant Nash germs is defined as a generalization involving equivariant data of the blow-Nash equivalence.

For any finite group G, we impose an algebraic condition, the Gnil-coset condition, and prove that any finite Oliver group G satisfying the Gnil-coset condition has a smooth action on some sphere with isolated fixed points at which the tangent G-modules are not isomorphic to each other. Moreover, we prove that, for any finite non-solvable group G not isomorphic to Aut(A6) or PΣL(2, 27), the Gnil-coset condition holds if and only if rG ≥ 2, where rG is the number of real conjugacy classes of elements of G not of prime power order. As a conclusion, the Laitinen Conjecture holds for any finite non-solvable group not isomorphic to Aut(A6).

We develop deformation theory for abelian invariant complex structures on a nilmanifold, and prove that in this case the invariance property is preserved by the Kuranishi process. A purely algebraic condition characterizes the deformations leading again to abelian structures, and we prove that such deformations are unobstructed. Various examples illustrate the resulting theory, and the behavior possible in three complex dimensions.

A group $G$ is said to have periodic cohomology with period $q$ after $k$ steps, if the functors $H^{i}(G,-)$ and $H^{i+q}(G,-)$ are naturally equivalent for all $i>k$. Mislin and the author have conjectured that periodicity in cohomology after some steps is the algebraic characterization of those groups $G$ that admit a finite-dimensional, free $G$-CW-complex, homotopy equivalent to a sphere. This conjecture was proved by Adem and Smith under the extra hypothesis that the periodicity isomorphisms are given by the cup product with an element in $H^q (G,\mathbb{Z})$. It is expected that the periodicity isomorphisms will always be given by the cup product with an element in $H^q (G,\mathbb{Z})$; this paper shows that this is the case if and only if the group $G$ admits a complete resolution and its complete cohomology is calculated via complete resolutions. It is also shown that having the periodicity isomorphisms given by the cup product with an element in $H^q (G,\mathbb{Z})$ is equivalent to silp $G$ being finite, where silp $G$ is the supremum of the injective lengths of the projective $\mathbb{Z}G$-modules.

Using compact simple Lie groups and Heisenberg groups, we combine and generalize the constructions of complex structures on Kodaira surfaces and Hopf surfaces. We identify locally complete parameter spaces of deformations of these spaces and analyze the deformation of Kodaira manifolds in details.

Let $X$ be a closed, symplectic 4-manifold. Suppose that there is either a symplectic or an anti-symplectic involution $\sigma : X\,{\to}\, X$ with a 2-dimensional compact, oriented submanifold $\Sigma$ as a fixed point set.

If $\sigma$ is a symplectic involution then the quotient $X/\sigma$ with $b_2^+(X/\sigma)\,{\ge}\, 1$ is a symplectic 4-manifold.

If $\sigma$ is an anti-symplectic involution and $\Sigma$ has genus greater than 1 representing non-trivial homology class, we prove a vanishing theorem on Seiberg-Witten invariants of the quotient $X/\sigma$ with $b_2^+(X/\sigma)\,{ >}\,1.$

If $\Sigma$ is a torus with self-intersection number 0, we get a relation between the Seiberg-Witten invariants on $X$ and those of $X/\sigma$ with $b_2^+(X), b_2^+(X/\sigma)\,{ >}\,2$ which was obtained in [21] when the genus $g(\Sigma)\,{ >}\,1$ and $\Sigma\cdot\Sigma\,{=}\,0$.This work was supported by a Korea Research Foundation Grant (No KRF-2002-072-C00010).

We show that normal and stable normal invariants of polarized homotopy equivalences of lens spaces $M=\,L({{2}^{m}};\,{{r}_{1}},...,\,{{r}_{n}})$ and $N\,=\,L({{2}^{m}};\,{{s}_{1}},...,{{s}_{n}})$ are determined by certain $\ell $-polynomials evaluated on the elementary symmetric functions ${{\sigma }_{i}}\,(r_{1}^{2},...,r_{n}^{2})$ and ${{\sigma }_{i}}(s_{1}^{2},...,s_{n}^{2})$. Each polynomial ${{\ell }_{k}}$ appears as the homogeneous part of degree $k$ in the Hirzebruch multiplicative $L$-sequence. When $n=8$, the elementary symmetric functions alone determine the relevant normal invariants.

We investigate questions of spectral symmetry for certain first order differential operators acting on sections of bundles over manifolds which have a group action. We show that if the manifold is in fact a group we have simple spectral symmetry for all homogeneous operators. Furthermore if the manifold is not necessarily a group but has a compact Lie group of rank 2 or greater acting on it by isometries with discrete isotropy groups, and let D be a split invariant elliptic first order differential operator, then D has equivariant spectral symmetry.

The symmetries of manifolds are a focal point of study in low-dimensional topology and yet, outside of some totally asymmetrical 3- and 4-manifolds, there are very few cases in which a complete classification has been attained. In this work we provide such a classification for symmetries of the orientable and nonorientable 3-dimensional handlebodies of genus one. Our classification includes a description, up to isomorphism, of all of the finite groups which can arise as symmetries on these manifolds, as well as an enumeration of the different ways in which they can arise. To be specific, we will classify the equivalence, weak equivalence and strong equivalence classes of (effective) finite group actions on the genus one handlebodies.