Estimates for homological dimension of configuration spaces of graphs

Abstract

We show that the homological dimension of a configuration space of a graph Γ is estimated from above by the number b of vertices in Γ whose valence is greater than 2. We show that this estimate is optimal for the n-point configuration space of Γ if n ≥ 2b. 0. Introduction. Let Γ be a finite graph and n a natural number. The marked n-point configuration space of Γ is a subspace CnΓ in the nth cartesian power of Γ defined by CnΓ := {(x1, . . . , xn) ∈ Γ n : xi 6= xj for i 6= j}. Consider the natural free action of the symmetric group Sn on the space CnΓ defined by σ(x1, . . . , xn) = (xσ(1), . . . , xσ(n)) and put CnΓ := CnΓ/Sn. The space CnΓ is called the (unmarked) n-point configuration space of Γ . This paper reports on partial progress towards understanding the homology of configuration spaces of graphs, or even more generally of compact polyhedra. For another recent result in that direction, see [G]. We call a vertex v of Γ branched if it is adjacent to at least three edges. We denote by b = b(Γ ) the number of branched vertices in Γ . The main result of this paper is the following. 0.1. Theorem. Let Γ be a finite graph and n a natural number. (1) There exists a cube complex KnΓ of dimension min(b(Γ ), n) which embeds as a deformation retract into the configuration space CnΓ . (2) The fundamental group π1(CnΓ ) contains a subgroup isomorphic to the free abelian group Z with k = min(b(Γ ), [n/2]), where [x] denotes the integer part of x. 2000 Mathematics Subject Classification: Primary 55M10; Secondary 20J05, 51F99. The author was supported by the Polish State Committee for Scientific Research (KBN) grant 2 P03A 023 14.