George Turcas

Lecture #1 Notes Summary

Intro to Topology: Lecture #1 Notes

October 1, 2013

What is topology? Examples. Homomeomorphism. Topology versus metric spaces. Manifolds. Lecure notes are available online already and they will be made available in printed version, but later in the term. There will be problem sheets, but they dont count for credit.

Topics Covered Page The fundamental group (to be discussed later) Classication of surfaces (to be discussed later) Topology vs metric spaces Why study topology instead of metrics? 1 1 1 2

The fundamental group (to be discussed later)

To each topological space X we assign a group 1 (X ), by a systematic procedure ( very roughly speaking, 1 (X ) = loops in X ), in such a way that a continuous map f : X Y induces a homomorphism of groups from f : 1 (X ) 1 (Y ) and such that if f is a homeomorphism then f is an isomorphism. The procedure X 1 (X ), f f is an example of a functor.

Classication of surfaces (to be discussed later)

Every compact, orientable surface is homeomorphic to one of the following : 2 sphere S 2 , torus, genus 2 surface, genus 3 surface, . . . There are innitely many categories, but they are not that dierent. The classication of 3 dimensional manifolds has been a very important problem in the 20th century. We are going to do the classication of the 2 dimensional manifolds.

Topology vs metric spaces

Revision. Given X a space with metric d, then we dene the ball B (x0 , ) = {x X |d(x, x0 ) < }. The set U X is open if x0 U, > 0 such that B (x0 , ) U . Example. In R, any open interval. In any metric space, any ball is itself open. Denition. A topological space is a set X together with a collection T of subsets of X such that i) X T and T ; ii) If U , A is a collection of members of T , then the union U T and also T is closed under
A

nite intersections. T is called a topology on X . The members of this collection are called open sets. Example. If (X, d) is a metric space, then the collection of open sets as dened above using balls is a topology. Denition. Let (X1 , T1 ) and (X2 , T2 ) be topological spaces. A map f : X1 X2 is said to be continuous if for every U T2 , we have f 1 (U ) T1 .

Topology vs metric spaces continued on next page. . .

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George Turcas

Intro to Topology: Lecture #1 Notes

October 1, 2013

Denition. Let (X1 , d1 ) and (X2 , d2 ) be metric spaces. A map from f : X1 X2 is said to be continuous at a point x0 X1 if > 0, > 0 such that if x B (x0 , ) then f (x) B (f (x0 ), ).

Why study topology instead of metrics?

Many spaces do not have natural metrics. For example if we consider the space C k [0, 1], we can nd many dierent metrics on this space. d0 (f, g ) = sup{|f (x) g (x)| : x [0, 1]} d1 (f, g ) = d0 + sup{|f (x) g (x)| : x [0, 1]} and inductively we can dene dk in the same way. But what happens to C [0, 1]. Of course d cant be dened by continuing this process. Since R is not compact, sup{|f (x) g (x)| : x R} can be .

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