An additivity theorem for cobordism categories

Abstract

Using methods inspired from algebraic $K$-theory, we give a new proof of the Genauer fibration sequence, relating the cobordism categories of closed manifolds with cobordism categories of manifolds with boundaries, and of the B\"okstedt-Madsen delooping of the cobordism category. Unlike the existing proofs, this approach generalizes to other cobordism-like categories of interest. Indeed we argue that the Genauer fibration sequence is an analogue, in the setting of cobordism categories, of Waldhausen's Additivity theorem in algebraic $K$-theory.