Bohr compactification

Given a topological group G, the Bohr compactification of G is a compact Hausdorff topological group Bohr(G) and a continuous homomorphism[1]

b: G → Bohr(G)

which is universal with respect to homomorphisms into compact Hausdorff groups; this means that if K is another compact Hausdorff topological group and

f: G → K

is a continuous homomorphism, then there is a unique continuous homomorphism

Bohr(f): Bohr(G) → K

such that f = Bohr(f) ∘ b.

Theorem. The Bohr compactification exists[2][3] and is unique up to isomorphism.

We will denote the Bohr compactification of G by Bohr(G) and the canonical map by

${\displaystyle \mathbf {b} :G\rightarrow \mathbf {Bohr} (G).}$

The correspondence G ↦ Bohr(G) defines a covariant functor on the category of topological groups and continuous homomorphisms.

The Bohr compactification is intimately connected to the finite-dimensional unitary representation theory of a topological group. The kernel of b consists exactly of those elements of G which cannot be separated from the identity of G by finite-dimensional unitary representations.

The Bohr compactification also reduces many problems in the theory of almost periodic functions on topological groups to that of functions on compact groups.

A bounded continuous complex-valued function f on a topological group G is uniformly almost periodic if and only if the set of right translates _gf where

${\displaystyle [{}_{g}f](x)=f(g^{-1}\cdot x)}$

is relatively compact in the uniform topology as g varies through G.

Theorem. A bounded continuous complex-valued function f on G is uniformly almost periodic if and only if there is a continuous function f₁ on Bohr(G) (which is uniquely determined) such that

${\displaystyle f=f_{1}\circ \mathbf {b} .}$[4]

Topological groups for which the Bohr compactification mapping is injective are called maximally almost periodic (or MAP groups). In the case G is a locally compact connected group, MAP groups are completely characterized: They are precisely products of compact groups with vector groups of finite dimension.

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• "Bohr compactification", Encyclopedia of Mathematics, EMS Press, 2001 [1994]