On Homomorphisms of Douglas Algebras

The paper describes homomorphisms between Douglas algebras and some semisimple Banach algebras. The main tool is a result on the structure of the space $C(Z,\mathfrak M)$ of continuous mappings from a connected first-countable $T_1$ space $Z$ to the maximal ideal space $\mathfrak M$ of the algebra $H^\infty$ of bounded holomorphic functions on the unit disk $\mathbb D\subset\mathbb C$. In particular, it is shown that the space of continuous mappings from $Z$ to $\mathbb D$ is dense in the topology of pointwise convergence in $C(Z,\mathfrak M)$ and the homotopy groups of $\mathfrak M$ are trivial.