Spaces over a Category and Assembly Maps in Isomorphism Conjectures in K‐ and L‐Theory

Abstract

We give a unified approach to the Isomorphism Conjecture of Farrell and Jones on the algebraic K- and L-theory of integral group rings and to the Baum-Connes Conjecture on the topological K-theory of reducedC-algebras of groups. The approach is through spectra over the orbit category of a discrete group G. We give several points of view on the assembly map for a family of subgroups and characterize such assembly maps by a universal property generalizing the results of Weiss and Williams to the equivariant setting. The main tools are spaces and spectra over a category and their associated generalized homology and cohomology theories, and homotopy limits. Mathematics Subject Classification (1991). 57-XX.