In this short survey we give a non-technical introduction to some main ideas of the theory of $\infty$-categories, hopefully facilitating the digestion of the foundational work of Joyal and Lurie. Besides the basic $\infty$-categorical notions leading to presentable $\infty$-categories, we mention the Joyal and Bergner model structures organizing two approaches to a theory of $(\infty,1)$-categories. We also discuss monoidal $\infty$-categories and algebra objects, as well as stable $\infty$-categories. These notions come together in Lurie's treatment of the smash product on spectra, yielding a convenient framework for the study of $\mathbb{A}_\infty$-ring spectra, $\mathbb{E}_\infty$-ring spectra, and Derived Algebraic Geometry.
The aim of this paper is to present a simplified version of the notion of $\infty$-groupoid developed by Grothendieck in "Pursuing Stacks" and to introduce a definition of $\infty$-categories inspired by Grothendieck's approach.
We study the *homotopy theory* of $\infty$-categories enriched in the $\infty$-category $sS$ of simplicial spaces. That is, we consider $sS$-enriched $\infty$-categories as presentations of ordinary $\infty$-categories by means of a "local" geometric realization functor $Cat_{sS} \to Cat_\infty$, and we prove that their homotopy theory presents the $\infty$-category of $\infty$-categories, i.e. that this functor induces an equivalence $Cat_{sS} [[ W_{DK}^{-1} ]] \xrightarrow{\sim} Cat_\infty$ from a localization of the $\infty$-category of $sS$-enriched $\infty$-categories. Following Dwyer--Ka…
In this paper we introduce a notion of $\mathbf{O}$-monoidal $\infty$-categories for a finite sequence $\mathbf{O}^{\otimes}$ of $\infty$-operads, which is a generalization of the notion of higher monoidal categories in the setting of $\infty$-categories. We show that the $\infty$-category of coCartesian $\mathbf{O}$-monoidal $\infty$-categories and right adjoint lax $\mathbf{O}$-monoidal functors is equivalent to the opposite of the $\infty$-category of Cartesian $\mathbf{O}_{\rm rev}$-monoidal $\infty$-categories and left adjoint oplax $\mathbf{O}_{\rm rev}$-monoidal functors, where $\mathbf…
The goal of this paper is to prove an equivalence between the $(\infty,2)$-category of cartesian factorization systems of $\infty$-categories and that of pointed cartesian fibrations of $\infty$-categories. This generalizes a similar result known for ordinary categories and sheds some light on the interplay between these two seemingly distant concepts.
We set up a general theory of weak or homotopy-coherent enrichment in an arbitrary monoidal $\infty$-category $\mathcal{V}$. Our theory of enriched $\infty$-categories has many desirable properties; for instance, if the enriching $\infty$-category $\mathcal{V}$ is presentably symmetric monoidal then $\mathrm{Cat}^\mathcal{V}_\infty$ is as well. These features render the theory useful even when an $\infty$-category of enriched $\infty$-categories comes from a model category (as is often the case in examples of interest, e.g. dg-categories, spectral categories, and $(\infty,n)$-categories). This…
In this short note we prove that two definitions of (co)ends in $\infty$-categories, via twisted arrow $\infty$-categories and via $\infty$-categories of simplices, are equivalent. We also show that weighted (co)limits, which can be defined as certain (co)ends, can alternatively be described as (co)limits over left and right fibrations, respectively.
We use Lurie's symmetric monoidal envelope functor to give two new descriptions of $\infty$-operads: as certain symmetric monoidal $\infty$-categories whose underlying symmetric monoidal $\infty$-groupoids are free, and as certain symmetric monoidal $\infty$-categories equipped with a symmetric monoidal functor to finite sets (with disjoint union as tensor product). The latter leads to a third description of $\infty$-operads, as a localization of a presheaf $\infty$-category, and we use this to give a simple proof of the equivalence between Lurie's and Barwick's models for $\infty$-operads.
While many different models for $(\infty,1)$-categories are currently being used, it is known that they are Quillen equivalent to one another. Several higher-order analogues of them are being developed as models for $(\infty, n)$-categories. In this paper, we establish model structures for some naturally arising categories of objects which should be thought of as $(\infty,n)$-categories. Furthermore, we establish Quillen equivalences between them.
We extend some classical results of Bousfield on homology localizations and nilpotent completions to a presentably symmetric monoidal stable $\infty$-category $\mathscr{M}$ admitting a multiplicative left-complete $t$-structure. If $E$ is a homotopy commutative algebra in $\mathscr{M}$ we show that $E$-nilpotent completion, $E$-localization, and a suitable formal completion agree on bounded below objects when $E$ satisfies some reasonable conditions.
We introduce a notion of bimodule in the setting of enriched $\infty$-categories, and use this to construct a double $\infty$-category of enriched $\infty$-categories where the two kinds of 1-morphisms are functors and bimodules. We then consider a natural definition of natural transformations in this context, and show that in the underlying $(\infty,2)$-category of enriched $\infty$-categories with functors as 1-morphisms the 2-morphisms are given by natural transformations.
We show that the homotopy theory of strict 2-categories embeds in that of $(\infty,2)$-categories in the form of 2-precomplicial sets. More precisely, we construct a nerve-categorification adjunction that is a Quillen pair between Lack's model structure for 2-categories and Riehl-Verity's model structure for 2-complicial sets. Furthermore, we show that Lack's model structure is transferred along this nerve and that the nerve is homotopically fully faithful.
In this paper we give a summary of the comparisons between different definitions of so-called (\infty,1)-categories, which are considered to be models for \infty-categories whose n-morphisms are all invertible for n>1. They are also, from the viewpoint of homotopy theory, models for the homotopy theory of homotopy theories. The four different structures, all of which are equivalent, are simplicial categories, Segal categories, complete Segal spaces, and quasi-categories.
We prove that various structures on model $\infty$-categories descend to corresponding structures on their localizations: (i) Quillen adjunctions; (ii) two-variable Quillen adjunctions; (iii) monoidal and symmetric monoidal model structures; and (iv) enriched model structures.
This paper is the second in a series of two papers about generalizing Quillen's Theorem A to strict $\infty$-categories. In the first one, we presented a proof of this Theorem A of a simplicial nature, direct but somewhat ad hoc. In the current paper, we give a conceptual proof of an $\infty$-categorical nature of the same theorem. This proof is based on the theory of join and slices for strict $\infty$-categories developed by the authors in a previous paper, and on a comma construction for strict $\infty$-categories generalizing classical comma categories and Gray's comma 2-categories. This $…
Goerss--Hopkins obstruction theory is a powerful tool for constructing structured ring spectra from purely algebraic data. Using the formalism of model $\infty$-categories, we provide a generalization that applies in an arbitrary presentably symmetric monoidal stable $\infty$-category (such as that of equivariant spectra or of motivic spectra).
We prove the existence of Morita model structures on the categories of small simplicial categories, simplicial sets, simplicial operads and dendroidal sets, modelling the Morita homotopy theory of $(\infty,1)$-categories and $\infty$-operads. We give a characterization of the weak equivalences in terms of simplicial presheaves, simplicial algebras and slice categories. In the case of the Morita model structure for simplicial categories and simplicial operads, we also show that each of these model structures can be obtained as an explicit left Bousfield localization of the Bergner model structu…
We prove the compatibility between the suspension construction and the complicial nerve of $ω$-categories. As a motivating application, we produce a Quillen pair between the models of $(\infty,n)$-categories given by Rezk's complete Segal $Θ_n$-spaces and Verity's $n$-complicial sets.
We define for each $n \geq 1$ a symmetric monoidal $(\infty, n+1)$-category $n\mathrm{Pr}^L$ whose objects we call presentable $(\infty,n)$-categories, generalizing the usual theory of presentable $(\infty,1)$-categories. We show that each object $\mathcal{C}$ in $n\mathrm{Pr}^L$ has an underlying $(\infty,n)$-category $ψ_n(\mathcal{C})$ which admits all conical colimits, and that conical colimits of right adjointable diagrams in $ψ_n(\mathcal{C})$ can be computed in terms of conical limits after passage to right adjoints.
We use the basic expected properties of the Gray tensor product of $(\infty,2)$-categories to study (co)lax natural transformations. Using results of Riehl-Verity and Zaganidis we identify lax transformations between adjunctions and monads with commutative squares of (monadic) right adjoints. We also identify the colax transformations whose components are equivalences (generalizing the "icons" of Lack) with the 2-morphisms that arise from viewing $(\infty,2)$-categories as simplicial $\infty$-categories. Using this characterization we identify the $\infty$-category of monads on a fixed object …
We construct a flagged $\infty$-category ${\sf Corr}$ of $\infty$-categories and bimodules among them. We prove that ${\sf Corr}$ classifies exponentiable fibrations. This representability of exponentiable fibrations extends that established by Lurie of both coCartesian fibrations and Cartesian fibrations, as they are classified by the $\infty$-category of $\infty$-categories and its opposite, respectively. We introduce the flagged $\infty$-subcategories ${\sf LCorr}$ and ${\sf RCorr}$ of ${\sf Corr}$, whose morphisms are those bimodules which are \emph{left final} and \emph{right initial}, re…
For most models of $(\infty,2)$-categories an embedding of the $\infty$-category of 2-categories into that of $(\infty,2)$-categories has been constructed in the form of a nerve construction of some flavor. We prove that all those nerve embeddings induce equivalent functors, modulo change of model. We also show that all the nerve embeddings realize the $\infty$-category of 2-categories as the sub-$\infty$-category of $(\infty,2)$-categories that are local with respect to a certain class of maps.
We define and discuss lax and weighted colimits of diagrams in $\infty$-categories and show that the coCartesian fibration associated to a functor is given by its lax colimit. A key ingredient, of independent interest, is a simple characterization of the free Cartesian fibration associated to a a functor of $\infty$-categories. As an application of these results, we prove that lax representable functors are preserved under exponentiation, and also that the total space of a presentable Cartesian fibration between $\infty$-categories is presentable, generalizing a theorem of Makkai and Paré to t…
Evidence is given for the correctness of the Joyal-Riehl-Verity construction of the homotopy bicategory of the $(\infty, 2)$-category of $(\infty, 1)$-categories; in particular, it is shown that the analogous construction using complete Segal spaces instead of quasicategories yields a bicategorically equivalent 2-category.
In this paper we show that the known models for $(\infty, 1)$-categories can all be extended to equivariant versions for any discrete group $G$. We show that in two of the models we can also consider actions of any simplicial group $G$.
In this paper we study duoidal structures on $\infty$-categories of operadic modules. Let $\mathcal{O}^{\otimes}$ be a small coherent $\infty$-operad and let $\mathcal{P}^{\otimes}$ be an $\infty$-operad. If a $\mathcal{P}\otimes\mathcal{O}$-monoidal $\infty$-category $\mathcal{C}^{\otimes}$ has a sufficient supply of colimits, then we show that the $\infty$-category ${\rm Mod}_A^{\mathcal{O}}(\mathcal{C})$ of $\mathcal{O}$-$A$-modules in $\mathcal{C}^{\otimes}$ has a structure of $(\mathcal{P},\mathcal{O})$-duoidal $\infty$-category for any $\mathcal{P}\otimes\mathcal{O}$-algebra object $A$.
The aim of this paper is to prove a generalization of the famous Theorem A of Quillen for strict $\infty$-categories. This result is central to the homotopy theory of strict $\infty$-categories developed by the authors. The proof presented here is of a simplicial nature and uses Steiner's theory of augmented directed complexes. In a subsequent paper, we will prove the same result by purely $\infty$-categorical methods.
Adjoint functor theorems give necessary and sufficient conditions for a functor to admit an adjoint. In this paper we prove general adjoint functor theorems for functors between $\infty$-categories. One of our main results is an $\infty$-categorical generalization of Freyd's classical General Adjoint Functor Theorem. As an application of this result, we recover Lurie's adjoint functor theorems for presentable $\infty$-categories. We also discuss the comparison between adjunctions of $\infty$-categories and homotopy adjunctions, and give a treatment of Brown representability for $\infty$-catego…
Inspired by Lurie's theory of quasi-unital algebras we prove an analogous result for $\infty$-categories. In particular, we show that the unital structure of an $\infty$-category can be uniquely recovered from the underlying non-unital structure once suitable candidates for units have been identified. The main result of this paper can be used to produce a proof for the 1-dimensional cobordism hypothesis, as described in a forthcoming paper.
This chapter, written for "Stable categories and structured ring spectra," edited by Andrew J. Blumberg, Teena Gerhardt, and Michael A. Hill, surveys the history of homotopical categories, from Gabriel and Zisman's categories of fractions to Quillen's model categories, through Dwyer and Kan's simplicial localizations and culminating in $(\infty,1)$-categories, first introduced through concrete models and later re-conceptualized in a model-independent framework. This reader is not presumed to have prior acquaintance with any of these concepts. Suggested exercises are included to fertilize intui…
In this paper we give an example of duoidal $\infty$-categories. We introduce map $\mathcal{O}$-monoidales in an $\mathcal{O}$-monoidal $(\infty,2)$-category for an $\infty$-operad $\mathcal{O}^{\otimes}$. We show that the endomorphism mapping $\infty$-category of a map $\mathcal{O}$-monoidale is a coCartesian $(Δ^{\rm op},\mathcal{O})$-duoidal $\infty$-category. After that, we introduce a convolution product on the mapping $\infty$-category from an $\mathcal{O}$-comonoidale to an $\mathcal{O}$-monoidale. We show that the $\mathcal{O}$-monoidal structure on the duoidal endomorphism mapping $\i…
