Pointed space

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In mathematics, a pointed space or based space is a topological space with a
distinguished point, the basepoint. The distinguished point is just simply one
particular point, picked out from the space, and given a name, such as {\
displaystyle x_{0},}x_0, that remains unchanged during subsequent discussion, and
is kept track of during all operations.

Maps of pointed spaces (based maps) are continuous maps preserving basepoints,
i.e., a map {\displaystyle f}f between a pointed space {\displaystyle X}X with
basepoint {\displaystyle x_{0}}x_{0} and a pointed space {\displaystyle Y}Y with
basepoint {\displaystyle y_{0}}y_{0} is a based map if it is continuous with
respect to the topologies of {\displaystyle X}X and {\displaystyle Y}Y and if {\
displaystyle f\left(x_{0}\right)=y_{0}.}{\displaystyle f\left(x_{0}\right)=y_{0}.}
This is usually denoted

{\displaystyle f:\left(X,x_{0}\right)\to \left(Y,y_{0}\right).}{\displaystyle f:\

left(X,x_{0}\right)\to \left(Y,y_{0}\right).}
Pointed spaces are important in algebraic topology, particularly in homotopy
theory, where many constructions, such as the fundamental group, depend on a choice
of basepoint.

The pointed set concept is less important; it is anyway the case of a pointed
discrete space.

Pointed spaces are often taken as a special case of the relative topology, where
the subset is a single point. Thus, much of homotopy theory is usually developed on
pointed spaces, and then moved to relative topologies in algebraic topology.

Contents
1 Category of pointed spaces
2 Operations on pointed spaces
3 See also
4 References
Category of pointed spaces
The class of all pointed spaces forms a category Top{\displaystyle \bullet }\bullet
with basepoint preserving continuous maps as morphisms. Another way to think about
this category is as the comma category, ({\displaystyle \{\bullet \}\downarrow }{\
displaystyle \{\bullet \}\downarrow } Top) where {\displaystyle \{\bullet \}}{\
displaystyle \{\bullet \}} is any one point space and Top is the category of
topological spaces. (This is also called a coslice category denoted {\
displaystyle \{\bullet \}/}{\displaystyle \{\bullet \}/}Top.) Objects in this
category are continuous maps {\displaystyle \{\bullet \}\to X.}{\displaystyle \{\
bullet \}\to X.} Such maps can be thought of as picking out a basepoint in {\
displaystyle X.}X. Morphisms in ({\displaystyle \{\bullet \}\downarrow }{\
displaystyle \{\bullet \}\downarrow } Top) are morphisms in Top for which the
following diagram commutes:

PointedSpace-01.png

It is easy to see that commutativity of the diagram is equivalent to the condition

that {\displaystyle f}f preserves basepoints.

As a pointed space, {\displaystyle \{\bullet \}}{\displaystyle \{\bullet \}} is a

zero object in Top{\displaystyle \{\bullet \}}{\displaystyle \{\bullet \}}, while
it is only a terminal object in Top.

There is a forgetful functor Top{\displaystyle \{\bullet \}}{\displaystyle \{\

bullet \}} {\displaystyle \to }\to Top which "forgets" which point is the
basepoint. This functor has a left adjoint which assigns to each topological space
{\displaystyle X}X the disjoint union of {\displaystyle X}X and a one-point space
{\displaystyle \{\bullet \}}{\displaystyle \{\bullet \}} whose single element is
taken to be the basepoint.

Operations on pointed spaces

A subspace of a pointed space {\displaystyle X}X is a topological subspace {\
displaystyle A\subseteq X}A\subseteq X which shares its basepoint with {\
displaystyle X}X so that the inclusion map is basepoint preserving.
One can form the quotient of a pointed space {\displaystyle X}X under any
equivalence relation. The basepoint of the quotient is the image of the basepoint
in {\displaystyle X}X under the quotient map.
One can form the product of two pointed spaces {\displaystyle \left(X,x_{0}\
right),}{\displaystyle \left(X,x_{0}\right),} {\displaystyle \left(Y,y_{0}\right)}
{\displaystyle \left(Y,y_{0}\right)} as the topological product {\displaystyle X\
times Y}X\times Y with {\displaystyle \left(x_{0},y_{0}\right)}{\displaystyle \
left(x_{0},y_{0}\right)}serving as the basepoint.
The coproduct in the category of pointed spaces is the wedge sum, which can be
thought of as the 'one-point union' of spaces.
The smash product of two pointed spaces is essentially the quotient of the direct
product and the wedge sum. We would like to say that the smash product turns the
category of pointed spaces into a symmetric monoidal category with the pointed 0-
sphere as the unit object, but this is false for general spaces: the associativity
condition might fail. But it is true for some more restricted categories of spaces,
such as compactly generated weak Hausdorff ones.
The reduced suspension {\displaystyle \Sigma X}\Sigma X of a pointed space {\
displaystyle X}X is (up to a homeomorphism) the smash product of {\displaystyle X}X
and the pointed circle {\displaystyle S^{1}.}S^{1}.
The reduced suspension is a functor from the category of pointed spaces to itself.
This functor is left adjoint to the functor {\displaystyle \Omega }\Omega taking a
pointed space {\displaystyle X}X to its loop space {\displaystyle \Omega X}\Omega
X.
See also
Category of groups
Category of metric spaces
Category of sets
Category of topological spaces
Category of topological vector spaces – Topological category