COHOMOLOGY RINGS

GREGORY D. LANDWEBER
Spheres:
H

S
n
; Z

= Z[a
n
] /

a
2
n
= 0

.
Complex projective spaces:
H

CP
n
; Z

= Z[a
2
] /

a
n+1
2
= 0

.
Real projective spaces:
H

RP
n
; Z
2

= Z
2
[a
1
] /

a
n+1
1
= 0

.
Unitary groups:
H

U(n); Z

=
Z
[a
1
, a
3
. . . , a
2n1
].
Special unitary groups:
H

SU(n); Z

=
Z
[a
3
, a
5
. . . , a
2n1
].
Special orthogonal groups:
H

SO(2n + 1); Q

=
Q
[a
3
, a
7
. . . , a
4n1
],
H

SO(2n + 2); Q

=
Q
[a
3
, a
7
, . . . , a
4n1
, b
2n+1
],
(Note that SO(n) has 2-torsion for n 7. See [1].)
H

SO(n); Z
2

i odd
Z
2
[
i
]/

p
i
i
= 0

,
where p
i
is the smallest power of 2 such that ip
i
n. See [5, Theorem 3D.2].
The exceptional Lie group G
2
:
H

G
2
; Q

=
Q
[h
3
, h
11
],
H

G
2
; Z

= Z[h
3
, h
11
] /

h
4
3
= h
2
11
= h
2
3
h
11
= 0

.
Additively, we have
H

G
2
; Z

Z, 0, 0, Zh
3
, 0, 0, Z
2
h
2
3
, 0, 0, Z
2
h
3
3
, 0, Zh
11
, 0, 0, Zh
3
h
11

.
See [1, Theor`eme 17.2].
The exceptional Lie group F
4
:
H

F
4
; Q

=
Q
[h
3
, h
11
, h
15
, h
23
],
H

F
4
; Z

= H

G
2
S
15
; Z

Z[u
8
, u
23
] /

3u
8
= u
3
8
= u
2
23
= u
8
u
23
= 0

.
See [1, Theor`eme 19.2].
Date: August 21, 2006.
1
2 GREGORY D. LANDWEBER
The exceptional Lie groups E
6
, E
7
, E
8
:
H

E
6
; Q

=
Q
[h
3
, h
9
, h
11
, h
15
, h
17
, h
23
],
H

E
7
; Q

=
Q
[h
3
, h
11
, h
15
, h
19
, h
23
, h
27
, h
35
],
H

E
8
; Q

=
Q
[h
3
, h
15
, h
23
, h
27
, h
35
, h
39
, h
47
, h
59
].
See [4] and [3]. Furthermore, E
6
, E
7
, E
8
have no p torsion for p 7, p 11, and
p 11, respectively (see [2]).
A projective K3 surface over C:
H

K3; Z

Z in degrees 0, 4,
Z
22
in degree 2,
0 otherwise.
The intersection pairing on H
2
(K3; Z) is even, unimodular, and has signature (3, 19).
References
[1] A. Borel. Sur lhomologie et la cohomologie des groupes de Lie compacts connexes. Amer. J. Math.,
76:273342, 1954.
[2] A. Borel. Sur la torsion des groupes de Lie. J. Math. Pures Appl. (9), 35:127139, 1956.
[3] A. Borel and C. Chevalley. The Betti numbers of the exceptional groups. Mem. Amer. Math. Soc.,
1955(14):19, 1955.
[4] C. Chevalley. The Betti numbers of the exceptional simple Lie groups. In Proceedings of the International
Congress of Mathematicians, Cambridge, Mass., 1950, vol. 2, pages 2124, Providence, R. I., 1952. Amer.
Math. Soc.
[5] A. Hatcher. Algebraic topology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2002.
E-mail address: greg@cohomology.com
URL: http://www.cohomology.com/