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CorollaryStatement: Literature-sourcedProof: AI-adaptedprecheck passaudited 2026-08-16
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  • Literature-sourced: the exact statement appears in a cited source; only wording and notation differ.
  • AI-adapted: a semantically identical restatement of literature-sourced material, modulo indexing, notation, and boundary cases adopted by the library.
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A connected covering of a locally path-connected simply connected space is one-sheeted and trivial

Statement

Every connected covering of a locally path-connected simply connected space is one-sheeted and isomorphic to the identity covering.

Facts & Assumptions

Given: The objects, hypotheses, and choice principles stated above.

[F1]

For a covering p:E→B, the total space E is locally path-connected if and only if the base B is locally path-connected. (Local path-connectedness lifts and descends along covering maps).

[F2]

Endpoint-fixed homotopic paths in the base have lifts with the same endpoint whenever their lifts begin at the same point. (The endpoint of a lifted path depends only on its endpoint-fixed homotopy class).

[F3]

A topological space X is simply connected when it is nonempty and path-connected (def-path-connected) and, for every x0∈X, the group π1(X,x0) has exactly one element. (Simply connected topological spaces).

[F4]

A covering map is a continuous surjection p:E→B such that every b∈B has an open neighbourhood U for which p−1(U) is a disjoint union of open sets Vj, called sheets, and each restriction p∣Vj:Vj→U is a homeomorphism (def-continuous-map-top, def-homeomorphism-and-open-maps, def-disjoint-union-topology). Such a U is evenly covered, and p−1(b) is the fibre over b. A covering is trivial when it is isomorphic over B to a product projection B×F→B with F discrete. (Covering maps, evenly covered neighbourhoods, fibres, sheets, and trivial coverings).

Proof

technique · direct
1.1givenF1F3F2

Local path-connectedness lifts to the connected total space, making it path-connected.

2.1step 1.1F2F3F1

If two points lie in one fibre, join them upstairs; the projected loop is null-homotopic because the base is simply connected, while endpoint homotopy invariance forces its lift to have the same initial and final point.

3.1step 2.1F4F1F3

Thus every fibre is a singleton, and a one-sheeted covering is a homeomorphism by its local sheet descriptions.

4.1step 3.1∎

The preceding construction and implications establish the assertion.

Depends on

Used by

Dependency tree · two levels

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Sources