arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Michael W Davis.
We compute the cohomology with group ring coefficients of the complement of a finite collection of affine hyperplanes in a finite dimensional complex vector space. It is nonzero in exactly one degree, namely the degree equal to the rank of the hyperplane arrangement.
For any Coxeter group W, we define a filtration of H^*(W;ZW) by W-submodules and then compute the associated graded terms. More generally, if U is a CW complex on which W acts as a reflection group we compute the associated graded terms for H_*(U) and, in the case where the action is proper and cocompact, for H^*_c(U).
Associated to any finite flag complex L there is a right-angled Coxeter group W_L and a cubical complex Σ_L on which W_L acts properly and cocompactly. Its two most salient features are that (1) the link of each vertex of Σ_L is L and (2) Σ_L is contractible. It follows that if L is a triangulation of S^{n-1}, then Σ_L is a contractible n-manifold. We describe a program for proving the Singer Conjecture (on the vanishing of the reduced L^2-homology except in the middle dimension) in the case of Σ_L where L is a triangulation of S^{n-1}. The program succeeds when n < 5. This implies the Charney-Davis Conjecture on flag triangulations of S^3. It also implies the following special case of the Hopf-Chern Conjecture: every closed 4-manifold with a nonpositively curved, piecewise Euclidean, cubical structure has nonnegative Euler characteristic. Our methods suggest the following generalization of the Singer Conjecture. Conjecture: If a discrete group G acts properly on a contractible n-manifold, then its L^2-Betti numbers b_i^{(2)} (G)$ vanish for i>n/2.