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The ordinary Poincare duality statement here is for a compact manifold without boundary, of dimension $d$, oriented over the field $F$. Its fundamental class $[M{]}_F$ induces isomorphismsfor every $q$. For a manifold with boundary the appropriate statement is Poincare-Lefschetz duality with relative groups; the ordinary pairing need not be nondegenerate. Over a field, the universal coefficient theorem for cohomology identifies $H^{d-q}(M;F)$ with the full dual of $H_{d-q}(M;F)$. The cap-cup evaluation identity and duality therefore makea perfect pairing. Explicitly, a nonzero $a$ has a nonzero cap product, and a linear functional $b$ on its homology group takes a nonzero value on that product. The same argument in the other variable proves nonsingularity. On the whole graded cohomology, define $B(a,b)$ by taking the degree-$d$ part of $a⌣b$ before evaluation. For a nonzero component $a_q$ choose $b$ homogeneous of degree $d-q$ to pair nontrivially with it. All other components contribute zero in degree $d$. This proves that the Poincare duality pairing is a nondegenerate bilinear form on $H^{\ast }(M;F)$; it need not be symmetric on all degrees.

Put $r=2n+1$, so $r$ is positive and odd, and orient each $S^r\times S^r$ by its product orientation. The Künneth theorem gives integral cohomology $\mathbb{Z}$ in degrees zero and $2r$, ${\mathbb{Z}}^2$ in degree $r$, and zero elsewhere. Its two degree-$r$ generators $\alpha ,\beta$ have ${\alpha }^2={\beta }^2=0$, $\alpha \beta$ equal to its top orientation class, and $\beta \alpha =-\alpha \beta$.

For a connected sum of oriented manifolds, excision and the long exact sequence for deleting a ball show that deleting a ball removes the top homology class and leaves all lower positive homology groups unchanged. The boundary sphere represents zero in the punctured manifold: it is the boundary of its relative fundamental chain. In the Mayer–Vietoris sequence for the two punctured pieces joined along the separating sphere, the orientation class of the connected sum maps onto that sphere's class. The intermediate positive groups are consequently the direct sums of the groups of the two original manifolds. This also covers $r=1$, where the sphere is a circle and the boundary-class observation is necessary in the middle degree. Iterating and applying the universal coefficient theorem for cohomology givesHere $g\ge 1$; under the conventional extension $W_0=S^{2r}$ the same formula holds with a zero middle group.

Let $\omega$ be the top cohomological orientation class. The connected-sum pinch map to the wedge of the $g$ sphere products gives degree-one projections to each summand. Pull back the two factor classes from summand $i$ to obtain ${\alpha }_i,{\beta }_i$. Their product is $\omega$, since the projection has degree one. Classes from different wedge summands have zero positive-degree cup products, and graded commutativity of the cup product supplies the reversed sign. Thus the full cohomology ring of a connected sum of odd-dimensional sphere products is the graded free abelian group just displayed with multiplicationThe unit is $1$, and $\omega$ times any positive-degree class is zero by dimension. This describes all products, including ${\omega }^2=0$.

The smooth involution is a diffeomorphism, since it is its own inverse. Its fixed set is closed; discreteness and compactness therefore make it finite. The supplied positivity of $\det (I-D{f}_x)$ makes every fixed point nondegenerate with local index $+1$. The Lefschetz-Hopf fixed-point theorem then givesIndeed the degree-zero and top-degree traces are both one, because the manifold is connected and $f$ preserves its orientation; the middle degree is odd.

On $V=H^r(W_g;\mathbb{R})$, the form $\Omega (a,b)=⟨a⌣b,[W_g]⟩$ is a nondegenerate alternating bilinear form by Poincare duality and the oddness of $r$. Thus it is a symplectic vector space of dimension $2g$. Naturality and orientation preservation show that $T$ preserves $\Omega$, and $T^2=I$. For the eigenspaces of a symplectic involution, write $V=V_{+}\oplus V_{-}$: the polynomial $(t-1)(t+1)$ has distinct roots over $\mathbb{R}$. If $v_{+}\in V_{+}$ and $v_{-}\in V_{-}$, then $\Omega (v_{+},v_{-})=\Omega (T{v}_{+},T{v}_{-})=-\Omega (v_{+},v_{-})$, so the two vector subspaces are orthogonal. Each restricted form is nondegenerate, since a vector annihilating its own vector subspace also annihilates the other and hence all of $V$. Their dimensions are therefore even, say $\dim V_{+}=2a$, $\dim V_{-}=2b$, with $a+b=g$. ConsequentlyThis proves the fixed-point congruence for an involution on an odd-sphere connected sum:

All groups in the first calculation have integral coefficients. Let $U=S^n\setminus j(W)$ and $V=S^n\setminus \mathrm{int}j(W)$. A two-sided tubular neighborhood of $j(\partial W)$ identifies $V$ as a compact manifold with boundary, with interior $U$. Pushing its boundary inward in a collar neighborhood gives a homotopy equivalence $U\simeq V$. After thickening across the same collar, excision identifies the relative groupsThe orientation of $S^n$ gives $W$ an orientation. The Poincare-Lefschetz duality isomorphism therefore givesEach component of $W$ has boundary: a closed component would have open image by the local embedding condition and closed image by compactness, hence would occupy the whole connected sphere, leaving no room for the components with boundary. In particular $U$ is nonempty, and $H^n(W)=0$.

Apply the long exact sequence in relative homology of $(S^n,V)$, using reduced homology for the absolute terms. Away from the top-dimensional homology of the sphere, it identifiesThe exceptional map iswhere $r$ is the number of components of $W$. Local compatibility of the orientations sends $1$ to $(1,\dots ,1)$, the relative fundamental classes of all the components. Its kernel is zero and its cokernel is ${\tilde{H}}^0(W)$. Thus the exceptional term has exactly the reduced form required, and all higher groups vanish. We obtain the Alexander duality formulawith negative-index cohomology zero. Ordinary degree zero is recovered byBoth formulas depend on the abstract manifold $W$, so they establish the requested independence up to group isomorphism. They make no claim that the complements themselves are homeomorphic or have isomorphic fundamental groups. The argument also covers $n=1$, when the diagonal map handles the degree-zero exception. This is the complement homology of a compact codimension-zero submanifold.

For the second calculation write $F={\mathbb{F}}_2$, $C=S^n\setminus i(M)$ and $c=n-k$. First suppose $c>0$, with $n\ge 1$. The rank-$c$ normal bundle has a mod-two Thom class, regardless of orientability. A tubular neighborhood, excision and the homological Thom isomorphism theorem identifyThe long exact sequence in relative homology becomes the Gysin sequence of an embedding:The map $\gamma$ takes the mod-two fundamental class of $S^n$ to that of $M$: restricting to each normal fiber evaluates the Thom class as $1$. Since $M$ is closed and connected, the degree-$n$ mapis an isomorphism. This cancels the exceptional top term and gives $H_i(C;F)=0$ for $i\ge n-1$ when $i>0$. In all the intervening degrees the sphere groups vanish. In degree zero, the remaining $F$ is removed by the augmentation. Consequently the mod-two homology of a submanifold complement iswhere negative-index homology of $M$ is zero. To recover ordinary homology, add one copy of $F$ in degree zero and change nothing in positive degrees. For $n=1$ the first range is empty, so the complement of a connected zero-manifold has the homology of a point. For example, codimension at least two gives $H_0(C;F)=F$, while codimension one gives $H_0(C;F)=F^2$ when $n\ge 2$.

If $k=n\ge 1$, an embedding of the closed connected manifold has image both open and closed in $S^n$, hence is onto; its complement is empty and all its ordinary homology groups vanish. The positive-codimension formula is not asserted in that case. The standard sphere calculations here assume $n\ge 1$; in ambient dimension zero the complement of the embedded connected point in $S^0$ is the other point.

For a closed oriented $d$-dimensional manifold over a field $F$, the cup product pairingis a perfect pairing between complementary degrees. The cap product with the fundamental class is an isomorphism by Poincare duality, and the universal coefficient theorem for cohomology over $F$ identifies the complementary cohomology with the full dual space of the resulting homology. Evaluation is therefore a perfect pairing. Taking the top-degree part of the same formula defines a nondegenerate bilinear form on the full graded cohomology. A boundary requires relative groups and Poincare-Lefschetz duality instead.