On the lambda algebra and Singer's cohomological transfer

Write $\mathbb A$ for the 2-primary Steenrod algebra, which is the algebra of stable natural endomorphisms of the mod 2 cohomology functor on topological spaces. Working at the prime 2, computing the cohomology of $\mathbb A$ is an important problem of Algebraic topology, because it is the initial page of the Adams spectral sequence converging to stable homotopy groups of the spheres. A relatively efficient tool to describe this cohomology is the Singer algebraic transfer of rank $n$ in \cite{Singer}, which passes from a certain subquotient of a divided power algebra to the cohomology of $\mathbb A.$ Singer predicted that this transfer is a monomorphism, but this remains open for $n\geq 4.$ This short note is to verify the conjecture in the ranks 4 and 5 and some generic degrees.

Stable homotopy groups of spheres

We discuss the current state of knowledge of stable homotopy groups of spheres. We describe a computational method using motivic homotopy theory, viewed as a deformation of classical homotopy theory. This yields a streamlined computation of the first 61 stable homotopy groups and gives information about the stable homotopy groups in dimensions 62 through 90. As an application, we determine the groups of homotopy spheres that classify smooth structures on spheres through dimension 90, except for dimension 4. The method relies more heavily on machine computations than previous methods and is therefore less prone to error. The main mathematical tool is the Adams spectral sequence.