A topological version of the Cartan-Hadamard Theorem and asphericity complexity

Abstract

We investigate a topological version of the Cartan-Hadamard theorem that allows one to study asphericity of spaces via distinguished families of paths. A topological space has the distinguished path property (dpp) if there exists a continuous map from the space $\Pi(X)$ of homotopy classes of paths (relative endpoints) to the path space $X^I$ that is a right inverse to the canonical quotient map. For complete metric spaces endowed with a locally convex metric, the distinguished paths are precisely the local geodesics. We show that if $X$ has the dpp, then its universal cover is contractible and, in particular, $X$ is aspherical. The space $\Pi(X)$ is a fiber bundle over $X$ whose fiber is the universal cover of $X$, and in the case of Riemannian manifolds of non-positive curvature it is naturally isomorphic to the tangent bundle. We prove that every aspherical CW-complex that is locally finite or countable has the dpp, and this allows us to reinterpret asphericity of CW-complexes in terms of the existence of continuous sections. We also define and study the notion of asphericity complexity of spaces by means of local sections from $\Pi(X)$ to $X^I$ and relate it to the concept of equivariant topological complexity introduced by Colman and Grant.