We introduce the notion of the equivariant covering type of a space X on which a finite group G acts and study its properties. The equivariant covering type measures the size of G-equivariant good covers of X and is thus an extension of the covering type of a space, introduced by Karoubi and Weibel. We show that the equivariant covering type is a G-homotopy invariant and describe its relation with other G-invariants, like the equivariant LS-category, G-genus, and the multiplicative structures of equivariant cohomology theories. We also compute the G-covering type of regular G-graphs, give estimates for orientation-preserving actions on surfaces and for the projectivizations of complex representations of G and cohomology spheres. As an application, we derive estimates of sizes of minimal G-triangulations for various G-spaces.

In this paper, we provide sufficient conditions for a space X to satisfy the Ganea conjecture for topological complexity. To achieve this, we employ two auxiliary invariants: weak topological complexity in the sense of Berstein–Hilton, along with a certain stable version of it. Several examples are discussed.

In this paper, we compute the LS-category and equivariant LS-category of a small cover and its real moment angle manifold. We calculate a tight lower bound for the topological complexity of many small covers over a product of simplices. Then we compute symmetric topological complexity of several small covers over a product of simplices. We calculate the LS one-category of real Bott manifolds and infinitely many small covers.

There is a problem with the proofs of [1], Lemma 4.4 and the related Theorems 4.5, 4.8 and 4.12 regarding the computation of zero-divisor cup-length of real Grassmann manifolds ${G_k({{\mathbb {R}}}^{n})}$. The correct statements and improved estimates of the topological complexity of ${G_k({{\mathbb {R}}}^{n})}$ will appear in a separate paper by M. Radovanović [2].

Topological complexity naturally appears in the motion planning in robotics. In this paper we consider the problem of finding topological complexity of real Grassmann manifolds $G_k(\mathbb {R}^{n})$. We use cohomology methods to give estimates on the zero-divisor cup-length of $G_k(\mathbb {R}^{n})$ for various $2\leqslant k< n$, which in turn give us lower bounds on topological complexity. Our results correct and improve several results from Pavešić (Proc. Roy. Soc. Edinb. A 151 (2021), 2013–2029).

For a graph $\Gamma$, let $K(H_{\Gamma },\,1)$ denote the Eilenberg–Mac Lane space associated with the right-angled Artin (RAA) group $H_{\Gamma }$ defined by $\Gamma$. We use the relationship between the combinatorics of $\Gamma$ and the topological complexity of $K(H_{\Gamma },\,1)$ to explain, and generalize to the higher TC realm, Dranishnikov's observation that the topological complexity of a covering space can be larger than that of the base space. In the process, for any positive integer $n$, we construct a graph $\mathcal {O}_n$ whose TC-generating function has polynomial numerator of degree $n$. Additionally, motivated by the fact that $K(H_{\Gamma },\,1)$ can be realized as a polyhedral product, we study the LS category and topological complexity of more general polyhedral product spaces. In particular, we use the concept of a strong axial map in order to give an estimate, sharp in a number of cases, of the topological complexity of a polyhedral product whose factors are real projective spaces. Our estimate exhibits a mixed cat-TC phenomenon not present in the case of RAA groups.

We show that well-known invariants like Lusternik–Schnirelmann category and topological complexity are particular cases of a more general notion, that we call homotopic distance between two maps. As a consequence, several properties of those invariants can be proved in a unified way and new results arise.

We use some detailed knowledge of the cohomology ring of real Grassmann manifolds Gk(ℝn) to compute zero-divisor cup-length and estimate topological complexity of motion planning for k-linear subspaces in ℝn. In addition, we obtain results about monotonicity of Lusternik–Schnirelmann category and topological complexity of Gk(ℝn) as a function of n.

We study the existence and concentration of positive solutions for the following class of fractional p-Kirchhoff type problems:

$$ \left\{\begin{array}{@{}ll} \left(\varepsilon^{sp}a+\varepsilon^{2sp-3}b \,[u]_{s, p}^{p}\right)(-\Delta)_{p}^{s}u+V(x)u^{p-1}=f(u) & \text{in}\ \mathbb{R}^{3},\\ \noalign{ u\in W^{s, p}(\mathbb{R}^{3}), \quad u>0 & \text{in}\ \mathbb{R}^{3}, \end{array}\right.$$

$sp \in (\frac {3}{2}, 3)$

$(-\Delta )^{s}_{p}$

We study Lusternik–Schnirelmann type categories for isolated invariant sets by the use of the discrete Conley index.

A subset $W$ of a closed manifold $M$ is $K$-contractible, where $K$ is a torus or Klein bottle if the inclusion $W\,\to \,M$ factors homotopically through a map to $K$. The image of ${{\pi }_{1}}\left( W \right)$ (for any base point) is a subgroup of ${{\pi }_{1}}\left( M \right)$ that is isomorphic to a subgroup of a quotient group of ${{\pi }_{1}}\left( K \right)$. Subsets of $M$ with this latter property are called ${{\mathcal{G}}_{K}}$-contractible. We obtain a list of the closed 3-manifolds that can be covered by two open ${{\mathcal{G}}_{K}}$-contractible subsets. This is applied to obtain a list of the possible closed prime 3-manifolds that can be covered by two open $K$-contractible subsets.

We give conditions which determine if cat of a map go up when extending over a cofibre. We apply this to reprove a result of Roitberg giving an example of a $\text{CW}$ complex $Z$ such that $\text{cat}(Z)\,=\,2$ but every skeleton of $Z$ is of category 1. We also find conditions when $\text{cat}(f\,\times \,g)\,<\,\text{cat}(f)\,+\,\text{cat}(g)$. We apply our result to show that under suitable conditions for rational maps $f,\,\text{mcat}(f)\,<\,\text{cat}(f)$ is equivalent to $\text{cat(}f)\,=\,\text{cat(}f\,\times \,\text{i}{{\text{d}}_{{{S}^{n}}}})$. Many examples with $\text{mcat}(f)\,<\,\text{cat}(f)$ satisfying our conditions are constructed. We also answer a question of Iwase by constructing $p$-local spaces $X$ such that $\text{cat(}X\ \times \,{{S}^{1}}\text{)}\,\text{=}\,\text{cat(}X\text{)}\,\text{=2}$. In fact for our spaces and every $Y\,\not{\simeq }\,*,\,\text{cat}(X\,\times \,Y)\,\le \,\text{cat}(Y)\,+\,1\,\text{cat}(Y)\,+\,\text{cat}(X)$. We show that this same $X$ has the property $\text{cat}(X)=\,\text{cat}(X\,\times \,X)\,=\,\text{cl}(X\,\times \,X)\,=\,2$.

Nous montrons que la $\text{A}$-catégorie d’un espace simplement connexe de type fini est inférieure ou égale à $n$ si et seulement si son modèle d’Adams-Hilton est un rétracte homotopique d’une algèbre différentielle à $n$ étages. Nous en déduisons que l’invariant Acat augmente au plus de 1 lors de l’attachement d’une cellule à un espace.