Characterizations of spectra with Uinjective cohomology which satisfy the Brown-Gitler property

Abstract. We work in the stable homotopy category of p{complete connective spectra having mod p homology of nite type. H(X) means cohomology with Z=p coecients, and is a left module over the Steenrod algebra A. A spectrum Z is called spacelike if it is a wedge summand of a suspension spectrum, and a spectrum X satises the Brown{Gitler property if the natural map [X;Z] −!HomA(H(Z); H(X)) is onto, for all spacelike Z. It is known that there exist spectra T (n) satisfying the Brown{Gitler prop-erty, and with H(T (n)) isomorphic to the injective envelope of H(Sn) in the category U of unstable A{modules. Call a spectrum X standard if it is a wedge of spectra of the form L ^ T (n), where L is a stable wedge summand of the classifying space of some elementary abelian p{group. Such spectra have U{injective cohomology, and all U{injectives appear in this way. Working directly with the two properties of T (n) stated above, we clarify and extend earlier work by many people on Brown{Gitler spectra. Our main theorem is that, if X is a spectrum with U{injective cohomology, the following conditions are equivalent: (A) there exists a spectrum Y whose cohomology is a reduced U{injective, and a map X −! Y that is epic in cohomology, (B) there exists a spacelike spectrum Z, and a map X −! Z that is epic in cohomology, (C) : 1Ω1X −! X is monic in cohomology, (D) X satises the Brown{ Gitler property, (E) X is spacelike, (F) X is standard. (M 2 U is reduced if it has no nontrivial submodule which is a suspension.) As an application, we prove that the Snaith summands of Ω2S3 are Brown{ Gitler spectra { a new result for the most interesting summands at odd primes. Another application combines the theorem with the second author’s work on the Whitehead conjecture. Of independent interest, enroute to proving that (B) implies (C), we prove that the homology suspension has the following property: if an n{connected space X admits a map to an n{fold suspension that is monic in mod p homol-ogy, then : nΩnX −!X is onto in mod p homology