Two rank- complex vector bundles over are isomorphic exactly when their Chern classes agree. Equality of Chern classes gives equality of their Chern characters; the Chern character is injective here because is torsion-free. The bundles are therefore stably isomorphic, and stable cancellation for complex vector bundles applies because has real dimension .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2019 iii Paper 142 1 Solution 2026-10-03
For a compact space , is the Grothendieck group of isomorphism classes of finite-rank complex vector bundles under direct sum. Tensor product descends to this group and makes it a ring, with as its unit.
The hypothesis says that and define the same stable class. Rank- bundles are classified by maps to , and the stabilization is -connected. Since the finite CW complex has dimension , stabilization is injective on . Thus stable cancellation for complex vector bundles gives
Now let have rank over Complex projective space and have the same Chern classes. Their Chern characters agree because each component of is a universal rational polynomial in the Chern classes. The ringis torsion-free, while the Chern character becomes an isomorphism after tensoring with ; it is therefore injective. Hence in K-theory, so after adding trivial bundles they are isomorphic. Since has real dimension , cancellation applies once more: