Seifert-van Kampen theorem
Statement
Suppose is a Path-connected space (?). Suppose
and
are nonempty open subsets of
whose union is
and whose intersection is also path-connected. Since
is path-connected, the intersection
must be a nonempty open subset of
, which we call
. Note that since all the four spaces
are path-connected, the fundamental groups of each of these spaces is independent of the choice of respective basepoint for each space.
We have natural homomorphisms for the Fundamental group (?)s induced by inclusion maps of the spaces(with respect to any chosen basepoint in , which we choose not to write for brevity):
The Seifert-van Kampen theorem has the following equivalent formulations:
- Category-theoretic version: The commutative diagram formed by the above four inclusions is a pushout.
- Group-theoretic version:
is the amalgamated free product of
and
via identification of the images of
in each. In other words:
Note that since the natural maps from to
and
need not be injective, this is not necessarily an amalgamated free product in the strict sense of a common subgroup being identified between
and
.
- Presentation version: Fill this in later
Applications
- Union of two simply connected open subsets with path-connected intersection is simply connected
- Suspension of path-connected space is simply connected (this is a special case of the preceding application)
- n-sphere is simply connected for n greater than 1 (this is a special case of both the preceding applications)
- Fundamental group of wedge of circles is free group of rank equal to the number of circles