Locally free module 2026-10-14
A locally free module is one whose associated sheaf is locally a free module. In the finite constant-rank case, it becomes free of rank on a principal open subset cover of . Equivalently it is a finite projective module of constant rank . A surjection onto it splits, so the kernel is also finite projective. Its associated sheaf is a locally free sheaf and defines an algebraic vector bundle.
// Target: algebraic-geometry.bigb
Locally free sheaf Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
A sheaf of -modules is locally free of finite rank when every point has an open neighborhood on which it is isomorphic to for some finite . If is connected, the rank is constant.
A sheaf of modules is locally free of rank if each point has a neighborhood on which it is isomorphic to . Finite-rank locally free sheaves correspond to vector bundles in the standard geometric settings.
Local trivialization Created 2026-10-05 Updated 2026-10-06
A local trivialization of a fiber bundle over an open set is a homeomorphism commuting with the projections to . For a vector bundle, it must be linear on each fiber. Compatible local trivializations specify the bundle structure and give its transition functions on overlaps.
Möbius line bundle 2026-10-05
The Möbius line bundle over the circle is
with projection to modulo . It is a smooth rank-one vector bundle. A section is represented by a function satisfying , so the intermediate value theorem forces every continuous section to vanish somewhere. Thus it has no nowhere-zero section and is not isomorphic to the trivial vector bundle of rank one.
Musical isomorphism 2026-10-05
A Riemannian metric gives inverse vector bundle isomorphisms
In coordinates they have matrices and . Every smooth manifold admits a Riemannian metric by a partition of unity, so its tangent and cotangent bundles are isomorphic as real smooth vector bundles. This isomorphism depends on the metric, not merely on the manifold.
For a regular value of a smooth map , let . The differential of a smooth map identifies the quotient vector bundle with the fixed target tangent space over every point of . After choosing a Riemannian metric, that quotient identifies with the normal bundle. Hence the normal bundle is trivial even when the target manifold has no global orientation.
The total space of a real vector bundle has the exact sequence . Taking determinant line bundles gives the displayed identity. If is an orientable smooth manifold, the total space is orientable exactly when is trivial. Sufficiency follows by pullback; necessity follows by restricting the total-space determinant identity to the zero section. For the cotangent bundle, base and fibre coordinate determinants cancel, giving an orientation even when the base is not orientable.
Orientation of a vector bundle Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
This is a fiberwise orientation compatible with local trivializations of a vector bundle. An -orientation of a rank- vector bundle is a coherent choice of generator of for every fiber, equivalently a Thom class with the corresponding fiberwise restriction.
A fiber metric on a smooth vector bundle gives a smooth orthogonal projection onto any vector subbundle. In a local frame of , let be the metric matrix and the columns of a frame of . Then , proving smoothness. The complementary subbundle maps isomorphically onto the quotient vector bundle. Explicitly is a vector bundle isomorphism , with inverse . This inverse is independent of the representative , but the splitting depends on the chosen metric.
An orthogonal structure is a reduction of the transition functions of a real rank- vector bundle to the orthogonal group. Its orthonormal frames define a fiber metric, independent of the chosen frame because orthogonal transitions preserve the inner product. Conversely a fiber metric gives smooth orthonormal frames by the Gram-Schmidt process, with orthogonal transition matrices. This equivalence does not require the vector bundle to be globally trivial.
For a metric connection on a vector bundle, the covariant derivative along a curve satisfies . If both sections are parallel, the right side vanishes. Thus parallel transport preserves the fibre inner product, not merely vector lengths, and is a linear isometry between the endpoint fibres.
For a smooth manifold of dimension , the tangent space can be defined as the space of derivations at : linear maps on germs of smooth real functions satisfying . Equivalently, is the velocity of a smooth curve through , with curves identified when their coordinate velocities agree. A chart supplies the basis , so .
The tangent bundle is the disjoint union , with projection . Its smooth structure is defined by the local local trivializations
On overlapping charts, the change of trivialization is
These are smooth changes of coordinates on a -dimensional smooth manifold, linear and invertible in each fibre. Thus is a rank- vector bundle, and its projection is a submersion. Fibrewise addition, scalar multiplication and the zero section are smooth. A smooth section of a vector bundle , satisfying , is exactly a vector field; locally , with components transforming by the displayed Jacobian matrix. Its action on functions is a derivation, and the commutator of two such derivations is their Lie bracket.
The dual bundle of is the cotangent bundle . Its smooth sections of a vector bundle are differential 1-forms, locally . The coefficient transformation is the inverse transpose of that for tangent vectors, ensuring that is a well-defined smooth function. Tensoring these two bundles gives the tensor bundles
Their sections of a vector bundle are tensor fields; their transition functions of a vector bundle are the corresponding tensor products of the tangent and cotangent transformations. For example, the bundle contains fields of linear endomorphisms, while contains symmetric bilinear fields. Taking alternating covariant tensors gives , whose sections are differential forms. The wedge product, exterior derivative and pullback of a differential form make these bundles central to integration, Generalized Stokes theorem and de Rham cohomology.
A nowhere-vanishing section of chooses an orientation of a smooth manifold; such a section exists exactly when is orientable. Without an orientation of a smooth manifold, one can still integrate sections of the density bundle , whose coordinate changes use the absolute Jacobian determinant. A Riemannian metric is a positive-definite section of . It identifies with by the musical isomorphisms and gives the Riemannian volume density
On an oriented smooth manifold, this density corresponds to a volume form.
Another organizing construction is the frame bundle . A frame over is a linear isomorphism , and the right action makes a principal bundle with general linear group as its structure group. Given a group representation , the associated bundle is obtained from pairs by the relation . The standard representation reconstructs ; dual, tensor and exterior representations reconstruct the associated bundles described above. A Riemannian metric reduces the frame bundle to the orthonormal frame bundle, with orthogonal group as structure group; an orientation of a smooth manifold reduces it further to the special orthogonal group . A global section of is a global frame, so it exists exactly when is a parallelizable manifold. Local triviality does not imply a global trivialization: the Hairy ball theorem prevents even one nowhere-zero vector field on .
A connection on a vector bundle differentiates its sections in tangent directions and defines parallel transport. For , the Levi-Civita connection is distinguished by compatibility with a Riemannian metric and vanishing torsion tensor. Its coefficients are not tensor components, because a coordinate change introduces second derivatives; the difference of two connections is a section of . The Riemann curvature tensor is a genuine tensor measuring the failure of covariant derivatives to commute.
Finally, a smooth map gives the pullback tangent bundle . Its sections are vector fields along a map, including the velocity of a curve and Jacobi fields along a geodesic. For an embedded submanifold , the derivative identifies with a subbundle of , and the quotient is the normal bundle. With an ambient Riemannian metric, the normal bundle is identified with the orthogonal complement of in ; the second fundamental form records the normal component of the ambient derivative of tangent fields. These constructions connect the bundle description to both intrinsic and extrinsic differential geometry.
The tangent bundle is a rank- smooth vector bundle over an -manifold; its dual, tensor, exterior, frame and pullback constructions encode the principal geometric fields and their natural operations.
For a smooth complex vector bundle , a connection is a complex-linear map satisfying for smooth complex functions . Local trivializations supply flat local connections. A locally finite smooth partition of unity subordinate to them gives ; local finiteness makes the sum smooth and gives the Leibniz rule. Thus connections on a vector bundle always exist on the usual paracompact smooth manifold.
Extend to bundle-valued forms by . Squaring shows that , so the curvature form is the endomorphism-valued two-form . With a row frame , write ; for coefficient columns , . Applying again and using the graded Leibniz rule gives
The cross terms and cancel. Hence the Cartan curvature matrix equation in this convention is
For a frame change , the connection matrix and curvature transform as and . Trace is invariant under conjugation, so the local forms patch into the global trace of vector-bundle curvature.
The induced determinant connection on is
where the one-form factor of each is placed in front of the section factors. In the local determinant frame , only the diagonal terms survive, so its connection form is . Its curvature is . Since
by pairing off-diagonal terms and using , we obtain
It is closed locally by , and thus closed globally.
For two connections, is a global endomorphism-valued one-form: the derivative terms cancel in their Leibniz rules. In a local frame , so
Taking traces cancels the mixed terms, because both factors are one-forms, and cancels . Therefore the trace curvature transgression formula is
The right-hand side is globally exact, proving independence of the de Rham cohomology class without needing a sheaf-cohomology identification.
Finally let be a holomorphic frame for the holomorphic line bundle, with . Define , extending by the Leibniz rule. If for a nowhere-zero holomorphic function , then and
This is exactly the line-bundle frame-change law for a connection, so the local definitions glue globally. Its part is the Dolbeault operator. Metric compatibility follows from , or for . These conditions uniquely force this , identifying the Chern connection. Since a scalar one-form wedges with itself to zero,
This agrees with the local formula for the Chern connection on a line bundle; keeping the order of the two Dolbeault differentials fixes the sign.
Take a locally finite trivializing cover of the real vector bundle , and a subordinate smooth partition of unity . Each trivialization identifies its fibers with and hence supplies a smooth Euclidean inner product there. Define
Each weighted term extends by zero outside its chart, since the weight has support within that chart. Local finiteness makes the sum smooth in every bundle chart. At each at least one weight is positive; for every nonzero contribution to is positive. Thus is a smooth positive-definite fiber metric, which is precisely an inner product varying smoothly with the fibers.
A G-structure on a vector bundle is a reduction of its frame bundle from to : a principal -subbundle whose extension of structure group is the full frame bundle. Equivalently, it is a choice of smooth local frames with transition matrices in , and the reduction consists of the right -orbits of these frames. The adapted frames are part of the structure, not merely a statement that an individual fiber has a basis.
Given a fiber metric, the Gram-Schmidt process transforms any smooth local frame into Euclidean orthonormal frames. At each step the squared norm to be divided out is positive, so the divisions and positive square roots depend smoothly on the base point. Two such frames differ by an orthogonal matrix. All the orthonormal frames therefore form a principal reduction, an orthogonal structure on a real vector bundle.
Conversely, let be an reduction. A frame in defines
Replacing by for leaves this rule unchanged, since preserves the Euclidean inner product. It is consequently independent of the adapted frame and defines a positive-definite fiber metric. Its coefficients are smooth in local adapted frames. These constructions are mutually inverse. An -structure is equivalent to a smooth fiberwise inner product.
For , the additional condition is an orientation of a vector bundle. Such a reduction supplies consistently oriented orthonormal frames, since its transition determinants are . Conversely an orientation together with a fiber metric selects the oriented Euclidean orthonormal frames and gives an reduction. Thus
It is not true for every real bundle. The Möbius line bundle is obtained from by . If it had an orientation, hence a nowhere-zero continuous section, its coefficient on the interval would satisfy while staying nonzero. The intermediate value theorem makes that impossible. Since , it has no reduction. For each , its direct sum with a trivial rank- bundle has transition matrix and determinant line equal to the Möbius line. It is also nonorientable and has no -structure. This obstruction concerns the bundle's orientation, independently of the existence of a metric.
We work over an algebraically closed field , so the assertion concerns a geometric projective line. Let and let be the vector space of homogeneous cubic forms on . It has dimension , so the parameter space of cubic equations up to nonzero scalar is . The Grassmannian parametrizes lines in . Its standard graph charts are four-dimensional affine spaces, so its dimension is four. The Plücker embedding realizes it as a closed quadric in , proving projectivity. The general linear group acts transitively on two-planes and is an irreducible open subset of the affine space of matrices; its orbit map proves that is irreducible.
Consider the incidence variety
Restriction of a cubic to a fixed line is surjective onto the four-dimensional space of binary cubic forms: after choosing coordinates with that line given by , extend any binary cubic using alone. Thus its kernel has dimension sixteen. On each Grassmannian chart these restriction maps depend algebraically on the line parameters and have constant rank four. Their kernels form a rank-sixteen vector bundle, and is its projective bundle, with fibre . In particular, is irreducible of dimension . It is closed in the product, since restriction vanishes precisely when four polynomial coefficients vanish.
The projection is a projective morphism, hence its image is closed. It remains to prove that this image has dimension nineteen. Equal dimensions alone would not suffice: we must control a fibre locally.
Take
In the open Grassmannian chart around , every line is uniquely a graph
Restriction of to that line is
The four monomials are linearly independent over every field. Hence the only line in this chart lying on has . The fibre therefore has local dimension zero at . We do not need to define a smooth surface, nor do we claim its entire fibre is finite.
The fiber dimension theorem, in its local dimension inequality, gives
Thus the closed image has dimension at least nineteen. A proper closed subset of the irreducible has smaller dimension, so . Every cubic equation consequently has a line in its zero set. In particular, every nonsingular cubic surface contains a line. The proof in fact establishes existence for arbitrary cubic surfaces over an algebraically closed field; it does not assert a rational line over an arbitrary nonclosed ground field.
Let be a separated Noetherian scheme over a field and a coherent sheaf. Coherent cohomology studies the groups : global sections in degree zero and the obstructions to gluing local sections in higher degrees. Coherence means finite generation locally, and on a Noetherian scheme it is preserved by kernels, cokernels and extensions. This makes coherent sheaves suitable for exact-sequence calculations.
For an ordered open cover , the Čech cochain groups are
with differential
Each double omission occurs twice with opposite signs, so . The Čech cohomology of the cover is , and taking the direct limit over refinements defines cover-independent Čech cohomology. In degree zero the sheaf gluing axiom identifies it with .
The comparison with derived-functor sheaf cohomology is particularly effective algebraically. Positive-degree cohomology of a quasi-coherent sheaf on an affine scheme vanishes. A separated scheme has affine intersections of affine opens, so a finite affine cover is acyclic for . Its Čech cochain complex consequently computes directly. For a short exact sequence of sheaves, sections over each affine intersection are exact on quasi-coherent sheaves. The resulting short exact sequence of Čech complexes gives the long exact sequence in sheaf cohomology. In particular, the connecting map measures the failure of a global section of the quotient to lift globally.
Several central projective results make the theory finite and computable. On a projective variety over , every coherent cohomology group is finite-dimensional. The Grothendieck vanishing theorem gives for . If is ample, Serre vanishing gives for sufficiently large , and these large twists are globally generated sheaves. On projective space a coherent sheaf has a finite twisting resolution of a coherent sheaf on projective space: finite sums of resolve it. The explicit line-bundle cohomology below and the long exact sequences prove finiteness and positive-twist vanishing. For a closed embedding , is coherent and , reducing these results to projective space. A sufficiently positive twist of a finite presentation by sums of also proves global generation.
The Euler characteristic of a coherent sheaf
is therefore defined, and the long exact sequence makes it additive. With a fixed projective embedding, is its Hilbert polynomial, and for sufficiently large it equals . On a smooth projective variety of dimension , Serre duality gives, for a vector bundle ,
For an arbitrary coherent sheaf the correct counterpart is ; replacing this Ext group indiscriminately by the cohomology of the ordinary sheaf dual would lose local extension information.
We now calculate the basic examples. For , use the standard cover of . Sections of on an intersection are degree- Laurent monomials in which negative exponents are allowed only for coordinates inverted on that intersection. Decompose the Čech cochain complex by exponent vectors with sum . If no exponent is negative, the corresponding simplex complex contributes only in degree zero. If all exponents are negative, the monomial occurs only on the full intersection and contributes only in degree . When the negative-index set is nonempty and proper, inserting any index outside it gives a contracting homotopy, so the monomial complex is acyclic. Hence the cohomology of twisting sheaves on projective space is
In the top group a basis consists of the Laurent monomials with every exponent at most . Writing reduces the count to nonnegative solutions of , giving the displayed binomial coefficient. In particular, all intermediate cohomology vanishes, and agrees with Serre duality. For separately, every twist is trivial and .
On the projective line this gives
Thus positive and negative degrees produce quite different groups, while their alternating difference is a single polynomial. The twisted cubic is isomorphic to and its hyperplane bundle corresponds to . Consequently for , agreeing with Q2, and .
For a smooth plane curve of degree , the ideal-sheaf sequence of a projective hypersurface is
The long exact sequence in sheaf cohomology and the preceding formula give and . Therefore
For this is zero; for a plane cubic it is one. Twisting the same exact sequence gives . These examples illustrate how Čech cohomology, vanishing, Serre duality and exact sequences convert local equations into global numerical invariants.
Use algebraic Chern classes in the Chow ring of a nonsingular algebraic variety . For a vector bundle of rank , the classes are invariant under bundle isomorphism, have , vanish for , and commute with pullback. Their Total Chern class is . The Whitney sum formula for Chern classes applies to every short exact sequence :
Normalization for a line bundle is , where is the divisor class. In particular, , , and the trivial bundle has total class one. These properties determine the classes: pull back to the iterated projective bundle where has a filtration by line bundles. The projective bundle formula for Chow groups makes this pullback injective, and Whitney multiplication expresses as the elementary symmetric polynomial of the first classes of the line factors. This also gives .
Let be the smooth degree- projective hypersurface and set . The algebraic cotangent bundle has rank . Restriction of the cotangent Euler sequence in homogeneous coordinates remains exact, because its terms and quotient are locally free. Thus
and Whitney multiplication gives
The defining equation has degree , so the conormal sheaf is . Smoothness makes its differential map injective with locally free quotient, giving the Conormal exact sequence for Kähler differentials
A second application of the Whitney sum formula for Chern classes yields
The inverse is the finite geometric series in the graded Chow ring: terms in codimension greater than vanish. Expanding gives every requested class,
For example,
when the corresponding ranks and codimensions exist. The first expression agrees with the canonical bundle of a smooth projective hypersurface . For a plane curve, , matching Q4. For a quartic surface in , and , whose degree is . These checks also confirm the sign in the cotangent, rather than tangent, formula.
For an oriented real vector bundle of rank , the Thom isomorphism theorem gives a unique Thom class restricting to the chosen generator in each fibre, and isomorphisms
Equivalently use the pair , identifying with the zero section. After forgetting relative supports, pull the Thom class back along the zero section to define the Euler class:
In this expression the relative class is first mapped to absolute cohomology.
A compact embedded submanifold equipped with a coorientation has an oriented normal bundle of rank . A tubular neighborhood and excision identify its Thom class with a class . Its image in is the cohomology class of a cooriented submanifold . In particular it restricts to zero on . If the ambient manifold is oriented, orient by the normal-first convention. The class is its Poincare dual, characterized by
for the appropriate complementary degree. This is the stated integration identity in cohomological notation.
First prove the Lefschetz fixed-point theorem for an oriented closed n-manifold . Orient its diagonal by the identification , and choose the normal orientation so this agrees with the normal-first convention in the product. This produces the integral class . To compute the part that contributes to the trace, tensor with : the trace on a finitely generated integral cohomology group means its trace on the free quotient, equivalently on rational cohomology; torsion contributes nothing.
Choose a basis of and its Poincare duality pairing dual basis , normalized by . The rational image of the cohomology class of the diagonal is
Indeed, pairing this expression against with degrees picks out the p-summands. The cross-product multiplication contributes and moving past contributes . Together with their product is . The result is , exactly the diagonal's defining identity. The rational Künneth theorem and nondegeneracy of the duality pairing determine the class. An integral torsion component, if present, is not determined by this rational expression and does not affect any evaluation below.
For the graph map , write . Pulling back the expression and evaluating gives the graph-diagonal formula for the Lefschetz number:
If has no fixed point, its graph lies in . The relative Thom class restricts to zero there, so and . The contrapositive proves the required fixed-point assertion, without requiring smoothness of or transversality of its graph.
The printed hypothesis does not require to be orientable. For a nonorientable , the diagonal's normal bundle is , so an ordinary integral coorientation cannot be assumed. We extend the proved theorem as follows, rather than apply the untwisted diagonal computation incorrectly. We first construct a smooth embedding in Euclidean space using finitely many charts and smooth functions supported in those charts, with at least one at every point. The map , with zero extensions, is injective: a positive first coordinate identifies a chart in which its remaining coordinates recover . Its differential is injective as well, since and force in a chart with . Compactness makes this injective immersion a homeomorphism onto its image. This finite-chart Euclidean embedding of a compact smooth manifold, enlarged by zero coordinates if necessary, has positive codimension. A compact tubular disc neighbourhood is an oriented N-manifold with boundary, inheriting its orientation from the ambient Euclidean space. Its double of a manifold is closed and oriented. Projection of each copy of to agrees on their common boundary, giving ; inclusion into the first copy gives with .
Set . A fixed point of must lie in , and then is exactly the image of a fixed point of . Moreover , and cyclicity of trace for maps between finite-dimensional rational cohomology groups gives
in each degree, because . Thus . The oriented theorem for now gives a fixed point of , hence of , whenever . This oriented manifold retract for the Lefschetz theorem proves the full printed result. The double construction also works componentwise if necessary.
Over the Grassmannian , the complex tautological bundle on a Grassmannian is
Its fibre at is the k-plane itself. A neighbourhood of a fixed plane consists of graphs of linear maps ; gives a local trivialization. The inclusions of coordinate spaces give the infinite Grassmannian and its tautological rank-k bundle .
Use the customary compact Hausdorff base convention for the classification of complex vector bundles by a Grassmannian; equivalently the argument uses finite subordinate partitions of unity. Give a rank-k complex vector bundle a continuous fiber metric given by Hermitian inner products. Choose a finite trivializing cover with local orthonormal coordinates , and a subordinate partition of unity with support contained in . Define
extending each component by zero off its support. This is continuous and satisfies , so it is a fibrewise embedding. The image planes vary continuously: in local frames, their orthogonal projection matrix is . Thus they define a map , and identifies with . This proves that every bundle is a tautological pullback vector bundle, by the finite-dimensional embedding of a complex vector bundle.
We next prove the two independence assertions that turn this construction into a bijection. First, homotopic maps have isomorphic pullback vector bundles. Pulling back along a homotopy gives a bundle over compact Hausdorff ; embed that bundle in a finite trivial vector bundle by the construction just given. Its image has a continuous family of rank-k orthogonal projection matrices . Compactness gives a subdivision with
Restriction of to the image at is injective: if it killed , then , impossible by the strict norm bound unless . Equal ranks make it an isomorphism, with continuous local inverses. Composing these bundle maps identifies the endpoint vector bundles. The fact that close orthogonal projections identify their image bundles therefore makes the pullback assignment well-defined on homotopy classes.
Conversely, suppose two classifying maps give isomorphic vector bundles. The infinite Grassmannian has its standard weak CW topology; the compact-subset property of CW complexes puts the compact images of the two maps in finite stages. Their tautological pullback vector bundles therefore give two finite-dimensional embeddings and of the same bundle, after using the vector bundle isomorphism. In orthogonal coordinate blocks interpolate by
At least one coefficient is nonzero, so every is injective and its image planes give a continuous Grassmannian homotopy. One endpoint uses the first block and the other the second block. Moving the latter coordinate copy to the standard one is a fixed unitary change of coordinates, connected to the identity by a path in the unitary group. Such a path exists by diagonalizing the unitary matrix and continuously varying its eigenvalue phases. Hence the original two maps are homotopic in the infinite Grassmannian. This also proves independence of all embedding and metric choices. Together the two directions establish
For arbitrary non-Hausdorff compact spaces without the required numerability, that usual bundle-classification statement needs additional hypotheses; the construction above specifies precisely the conventional setting being used.
Write . For the assumed fiber bundle with contractible total space, the long exact sequence of homotopy groups of a fibration has segment
For this gives group isomorphisms. For , the relevant pointed-set part and connectedness of give , corresponding to the single component . Thus the claimed formula includes its endpoint:
Finally the determinant gives a fiber bundle . Since , its exact sequence yields . The given identification and the degree calculation therefore give
The equality of free and based homotopy classes uses the simple connectedness just proved. Hence
The classification of rank-two complex vector bundles over the four-sphere is a bijection of isomorphism classes, labelled by the integer clutching function homotopy class after choosing a generator. It is not an assertion that Whitney sum gives a group operation on bundles of fixed rank two.