LECTURE 15

1 Quotient topology continued

Proposition 1 (Separation axioms for quotient spaces). 1. A quotient topological

space satisfies the first separation axiom if and only if every equivalence class
is closed.

2. A quotient topological space is Hausdorff if and only if any two distinct equivalence
classes are contained in two disjoint open saturated sets.

Proof. (1) The first separation axiom is equivalent to the statement that every singleton
{[x]} in X/R is closed.

The latter is equivalent to the fact that the inverse image of {[x]}, which is [x] seen
as a subset of X , is closed.

(2) is Exercise 5, Sheet 4.

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Examples 2. 1. Let S = n1 ; n ∈ N . Consider the partition of R composed of S
and all the singletons {x} with x ∈ R \ S , and the corresponding equivalence
relation R.

The quotient space X/R does not satisfy the first separation axiom.

2. Let X = [0, 1] × [0, 1], and let ℘ be the partition composed of

{(0, y), (1, 1 − y)} with y ∈ [0, 1], {(x, y)} with x ∈ (0, 1) .

The quotient X/℘ is called the Möbius band; it is Hausdorff.

 Indeed, consider two distinct equivalent classes {(0, y), (1, 1 − y)} and {(a, b)}
with a ∈ (0, 1).

For ε > 0 and δ > 0 small enough, the open saturated sets

[B((0, y), ε) ∪ B((1, 1 − y), ε)] ∩ X and B((a, b), δ) ⊆ X

are disjoint.

Similar arguments work for any two distinct equivalent classes in X/℘.

Proposition 3. 1. If X/R is Hausdorff then the graph of R is closed.

2. If the graph of R is closed and for every U open in X , p(U ) is open then X/R
is Hausdorff.

Remark 4. The converse of Proposition 3, (2), is not true.

Indeed, consider the Möbius band X/℘, a Hausdorff quotient.

The graph of the equivalence relation corresponding to the partition ℘ is closed, as

it is composed of the diagonal

∆ = {(v, v) ∈ X × X ; v ∈ X}

and of the two graphs

{((0, x), (1, 1 − x)) ; x ∈ [0, 1]} and {((1, x), (0, 1 − x)) ; x ∈ [0, 1]} .

But it is not true that for every U open in X , p(U ) is open in X/℘ (equivalently,
−1
p (p(U )) is open in X ).

Indeed for U = B((0, 1/2), 1/4) ∩ X , p−1 (p(U )) is

p−1 (p(U )) = [B((0, 1/2), 1/4) ∩ X] ∪ [{1} × (1/4, 3/4)] .

The set p−1 (p(U )) is not open, because it does not contain an open ball centred in
(1, 1/2).

2
Examples 5. R/Z is Hausdorff.
Indeed, the graph of the equivalence relation is the union of parallel lines
[
{(x, y) ; y = x + n} ,
n∈Z

and it is closed.
S
For any open set in U , p−1 (p(U )) = n∈Z (n + U ) which is open as union of open
sets. It follows that p(U ) is open in R/Z.
Proposition 3, (2), implies that R/Z is Hausdorff.
A similar argument shows that Rn /Zn is Hausdorff.

Definition 6. The real n-dimensional projective space P Rn is the quotient space of

Rn+1 \ {0} with respect to the equivalence relation
xRy ⇔ ∃λ 6= 0 such that x = λy .
In other words P Rn is the set of lines in Rn+1 through 0.

Example 7. For any n ≥ 1, P Rn is Hausdorff (Ex. 7, Sheet 4).

2 Quotient spaces and continuous maps

Proposition 8. The quotient topology is the largest topology making p continuous.

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Proof. Let T̃ be a topology on X/R such that p : X → X/R , T̃ is continuous.
Then for every U ∈ T̃ 0 , p−1 (U ) is in T .
It follows that U ∈ T̃ . We have thus proved that T̃ 0 ⊆ T̃ .

Proposition 9. A map g from X/R to another space Z is continuous if and only if

g ◦ p is continuous.
Proof. If g is continuous then g ◦ p is continuous.
Conversely, assume that g ◦ p is continuous. For every open subset V of Z , (g ◦
p) (V ) = p−1 (g −1 (V )) is open in X .
−1

According to the definition of the quotient topology, this implies that g −1 (V ) ∈ T̃ .

We conclude that g is continuous.