Complex K-theory of odd-dimensional real projective space Created 2026-10-05 Updated 2026-10-14
If is the complexification of a real vector bundle of the tautological bundle and , then
Realizing Real projective space as the circle bundle of the square of the tautological bundle on Complex projective space gives this through the K-theory Gysin sequence of a sphere bundle.
Mod-two restriction from complex to real projective space Created 2026-10-05 Updated 2026-10-14
Let be the standard inclusion. If and , then
The restricted complex tautological bundle is the complexification of a real vector bundle . Its underlying real bundle is . The Whitney product formula for Stiefel–Whitney classes gives total class , while the Stiefel–Whitney class of the underlying real bundle of a complex line identifies its second class with the reduced First Chern class. Dualizing changes the integral sign but has no effect modulo two. Thus the full induced map on cohomology sends to .
Extend complex-linearly to the complexification of a real vector bundle . Since , its and eigenbundles have smooth projections
Each has complex rank : complex conjugation interchanges them, and together they have rank . These are the type decomposition of the complexified tangent bundle. For an arbitrary almost complex structure, they are smooth complex vector bundles; a holomorphic vector bundle structure requires integrability.
When comes from a holomorphic atlas, write a holomorphic coordinate as . Its Wirtinger derivatives are
The induced almost complex structure has and . Hence the displayed vector fields are respectively and eigenvectors. They are linearly independent, and each collection has elements. Thus they give local frames for and respectively, with the holomorphic tangent bundle. The repeated in the first sentence of the printed item must be read as the two complementary eigenbundles.
Use the standard complex K-theory Thom class convention. For a rank- complex vector bundle, its K-theory Euler class is the pullback of the K-theory Thom class along the zero section, namely
Here denotes an exterior power, and a Hermitian metric identifies the dual bundle with the conjugate vector bundle. Choosing instead changes the K-theory Euler class by the unit , so its kernel and cokernel computations are unchanged.
For the disk bundle and sphere bundle , the K-theory Thom class identifies with . The exact sequence of this pair becomes the K-theory Gysin sequence of a sphere bundle:
The groups are two-periodic by Bott periodicity.
View Real projective space as the circle bundle of over Complex projective space, where is the tautological bundle. Indeed, maps to by ; in each fiber squaring identifies exactly and .
Use Complex K-theory of complex projective space in the form
The K-theory Euler class of is . Multiplying it by the unit gives . The K-theory Gysin sequence of a sphere bundle therefore gives
Under the projection , the pullback vector bundle is the complexification of a real vector bundle of the tautological bundle of Real projective space: the fiber map sends to . Thus pulls back to . Put . The relation gives , and gives . Hence
For completeness, these relations give precisely the abelian group . In the basis , the image of multiplication by is generated by ; its relation matrix is triangular with determinant , and the relations express every as . Thus there is exactly one cyclic torsion subgroup of order .
If and is in the kernel, successive coefficients of give , , and so on, up to . Hence , with arbitrary. For the multiplier is zero on . In all cases,
Finally let with , over . Since , multiplicativity of the K-theory Euler class gives
On , the image of multiplication by this K-theory Euler class is the subgroup generated by : multiplication by an integer produces every such multiple, while multiplication by only adds multiples of . Therefore
Multiplication by is zero on , since and this abelian group has no nonzero torsion elements. Thus the K-theory Gysin sequence of a sphere bundle gives a short exact sequence
It splits as an exact sequence of abelian groups because its quotient is a free abelian group. Consequently
The convention covers and . For example, when the sphere bundle is , a mapping torus of the antipodal map; its Topological K-theory has no nonzero torsion elements, agreeing with the formula. If is allowed, the rank-zero vector bundle has an empty unit sphere bundle, so instead.