Euler class groups, and the homology of elementary and special linear groups

Abstract

We prove homology stability for elementary and special linear groups over rings with many units improving known stability ranges. Our result implies stability for unstable Quillen K-groups and proves a conjecture of Bass. For commutative local rings with infinite residue fields, we show that the obstruction to further stability is given by Milnor-Witt K-theory. As an application we construct Euler classes of projective modules with values in the cohomology of the Milnor Witt K-theory sheaf. For d-dimensional commutative noetherian rings with infinite residue fields we show that the vanishing of the Euler class is necessary and sufficient for a projective module P of rank d to split off a rank 1 free direct summand. Along the way we obtain a new presentation of Milnor-Witt K-theory.