On the metalinear algebraic cobordism spectrum

Abstract

In this paper, we study the metalinear algebraic cobordism spectrum $\mathrm{MML}$ (also sometimes denoted $\mathrm{MSL}^c$), which is built from the structure groups of oriented vector bundles. We establish an interpolation between $\mathrm{MSL}$ and $\mathrm{MML}$ and deduce that the canonical morphism $\mathrm{MSL}\to \mathrm{MML}$ admits a retraction. We parametrize all such retractions in the category of $\mathrm{MSL}$-modules and, after fixing one of them, obtain an equivalence $\mathrm{MML}\cong\mathrm{MSL}\oplus \Sigma^{2,1}\mathrm{MGL}$. As an application of these results, we determine various invariants of the metalinear algebraic cobordism spectrum over a field (after inverting the exponential characteristic). More precisely, we determine the first few Milnor-Witt stems of $\mathrm{MML}$ in terms of the very effective algebraic and hermitian K-theory spectra, and the geometric diagonal of $\mathrm{MML}$ in terms of Stong's complex-spin cobordism ring. We also compute the slices and use them to describe the category of 2-inverted modules over the $\mathbb{E}_\infty$-ring spectrum $\mathrm{MML}$.