Maps Inducing Zero on Homotopy Groups – Not Null-Homotopic

at.algebraic-topologydg.differential-geometry

Today my fellow grad student asked me a question, given a map f from X to Y, assume $f_*(\pi_i(X))=0$ in Y, when is f null-homotopic?

I search the literature a little bit, D.W.Kahn

http://projecteuclid.org/DPubS/Repository/1.0/Disseminate?view=body&id=pdf_1&handle=euclid.pjm/1102995805

And M.Sternstein has worked on this, and Sternstein even got a necessary and sufficient condition, for suitable spaces.

http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/2037939.pdf

However, his condition is a little complicated for me as a beginner. Right now I just wanted a counter example of a such a map. Kahn in his paper said one can have many such examples using Eilenberg Maclance spaces. Well, we can certainly show a lot of map between E-M spaces induce zero map on homopoty groups just by pure group theoretic reasons, but I can not think of a easy example when you can show that map, if it exists, is not null-homotopic. Could someone give me some hint?

or, maybe even some examples arising from manifolds?

Best Answer

Consider ordinary singular cohomology with varying coefficients. You can look at the short exact sequence of abelian groups:

$$0 \to \mathbb{Z}/2 \to \mathbb{Z}/4 \to \mathbb{Z}/2 \to 0$$

This gives rise, for any space X, to a short exact sequence of chain complexes:

$$0 \to C^i(X;\mathbb{Z}/2) \to C^i(X;\mathbb{Z}/4) \to C^i(X;\mathbb{Z}/2) \to 0$$

and hence you get a long exact sequence in cohomology. Thus we get an interesting boundary map known as the Bockstein

$$H^i(X; \mathbb{Z}/2) \to H^{i+1}(X; \mathbb{Z}/2).$$

This is natural in X and so is represented by a (homotopy class of) map(s) of Eilenberg-Maclane spaces:

$$K(i, \mathbb{Z}/2) \to K(i+1, \mathbb{Z}/2)$$

This map is necessarily zero on homotopy groups. To show that this map is not null-homotopy, you just need to find a space for which the Bockstein is non-trivial. There are lots of examples of this. Rather then explain one, I suggest you look up "Bockstein homomorphism" in a standard algebraic topology reference, e.g. Hatcher's book.