LYCOS RETRIEVER Beta Retriever Home  |  What is Lycos Retriever?   
Topology: Spaces
built 634 days ago
Topology (Greek [T]opos, "place," and logos, "study") is a branch of mathematics that is an extension of geometry. Topology begins with a consideration of the nature of space, investigating both its fine structure and its global structure. Topology builds on set theory, considering both sets of points and families of sets.
Source:
A Möbius strip, a surface with only one side and one edge; such shapes are an object of study in topology. Topology is the study of how spaces are organized, how the objects are structured in terms of position. It ... studies how spaces are connected. It is divided into [A]lgebraic topology, differential topology and geometric topology.
TOPOLOGY Topology concerns geometric concepts such as distance, connectedness, and continuity, but in a fluid, flexible way. This can be contrasted with classical geometry which focuses on the geometry of rigid properties. The subject of topology can be developed in a beautifully abstract approach that has great simplicity, great generality, and yet great power. It has important applications to a host of fields, including cosmology (the shape of space), robotics, chaos, knot theory, and even internet searching.
Source:
See 55: Algebraic Topology for the definitions, and computations, and applications of fundamental groups, homotopy groups, homology and cohomology. This includes topics in homotopy theory -- studies of spaces in the homotopy category -- whether or not they involve algebraic invariants.
Source:
Topology is concerned with the intrinsic properties of shapes of spaces. One class of spaces which plays a central role in mathematics, and whose topology is extensively studied, are the n dimensional manifolds. These are spaces which locally look like Euclidean n-dimensional space.
SEARCH
MORE ABOUT