A (left) quandle is connected if its left translations generate a group that acts transitively on the underlying set. In 2014, Eisermann introduced the concept of quandle coverings, corresponding to constant quandle cocycles of Andruskiewitsch and Graña. A connected quandle is simply connected if it has no nontrivial coverings, or, equivalently, if all its second constant cohomology sets with coefficients in symmetric groups are trivial. In this paper, we develop a combinatorial approach to constant cohomology. We prove that connected quandles that are affine over cyclic groups are simply connected (extending a result of Graña for quandles of prime size) and that finite doubly transitive quandles of order different from [Formula: see text] are simply connected. We also consider constant cohomology with coefficients in arbitrary groups.
A versatile combinatorial approach of studying products of long cycles in symmetric groups