Equivalences of Smooth and Continuous Principal Bundles with Infinite-Dimensional Structure Group

Let K be a a Lie group, modeled on a locally convex space, and M a finite-dimensional paracompact manifold with corners. We show that each continuous principal K-bundle over M is continuously equivalent to a smooth one and that two smooth principal K-bundles over M which are continuously equivalent are also smoothly equivalent. In the concluding section, we relate our results to neighboring topics.Comment: 18 pages, final versio

Integrating central extensions of Lie algebras via Lie 2-groups

The purpose of this paper is to show how central extensions of (possibly infinite-dimensional) Lie algebras integrate to central extensions of \'etale Lie 2-groups. In finite dimensions, central extensions of Lie algebras integrate to central extensions of Lie groups, a fact which is due to the vanishing of \pi_2 for each finite-dimensional Lie group. This fact was used by Cartan (in a slightly other guise) to construct the simply connected Lie group associated to each finite-dimensional Lie algebra. In infinite dimensions, there is an obstruction for a central extension of Lie algebras to integrate to a central extension of Lie groups. This obstruction comes from non-trivial \pi_2 for general Lie groups. We show that this obstruction may be overcome by integrating central extensions of Lie algebras not to Lie groups but to central extensions of \'etale Lie 2-groups. As an application, we obtain a generalization of Lie's Third Theorem to infinite-dimensional Lie algebras.Comment: 51 pages, 3 figures, submitted version, to appear in Journal of the European Mathematical Societ

Principal 2-bundles and their gauge 2-groups

In this paper we introduce principal 2-bundles and show how they are classified by non-abelian Cech cohomology. Moreover, we show that their gauge 2-groups can be described by 2-group-valued functors, much like in classical bundle theory. Using this, we show that, under some mild requirements, these gauge 2-groups possess a natural smooth structure. In the last section we provide some explicit examples.Comment: 40 pages; v3: completely revised and extended, classification corrected, name changed, to appear in Forum Mat