Topologies on locally compact groups

Abstract

Using the Iwasawa structure theorem for connected locally compact Hausdorff groups we show that every locally compact Hausdorff group G is homeomorphic to Rn × K × D, where n is a non-negative integer, K is a compact group and D is a discrete group. This makes recent results on cardinal numbers associated with the topology of locally compact groups more transparent. For abelian G, we note that the dual group, Ĝ, is homeomorphic to This leads us to the relationship card G = ω0(Ĝ) + 2ω0(G), where ω (respectively, ω0) denotes the weight (respectively local weight) of the topological group. From this classical results such as card G = 2 card Ĝ for compact Hausdorff abelian groups, and ω(G) = ω(Ĝ) for general locally compact Hausdorff abelian groups are easily derived.