Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2024/iii/paper-114/4/a/solution

Let and be the pullbacks of the standard generator of from the two factors. The Künneth theorem and graded commutativity of the cup product give
Each homeomorphism acts invertibly on . To respect ordinary composition, send to ; functoriality of induced map on cohomology then defines a homomorphism
For , the space is the torus. Every matrix in induces a linear homeomorphism , so the image is all of .
For , write . Since and ,
so ; the same argument applies to . Invertibility then forces the matrix to be a signed permutation matrix. Every such matrix is realized by swapping the two sphere factors and applying an orientation-reversing homeomorphism to either factor. Thus the image consists exactly of the eight signed permutation matrices.

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