Semiinfinite Flags. I. Case of global curve $P^1$

The Semiinfinite Flag Space appeared in the works of B.Feigin and E.Frenkel, and under different disguises was found by V.Drinfeld and G.Lusztig in the early 80-s. Another recent discovery (Beilinson-Drinfeld Grassmannian) turned out to conceal a new incarnation of Semiinfinite Flags. We write down these and other results scattered in folklore. We define the local semiinfinite flag space attached to a semisimple group $G$ as the quotient $G((z))/HN((z))$ (an ind-scheme), where $H$ and $N$ are a Cartan subgroup and the unipotent radical of a Borel subgroup of $G$. The global semiinfinite flag space attached to a smooth complete curve $C$ is a union of Quasimaps from $C$ to the flag variety of $G$. In the present work we use $C=P^1$ to construct the category $PS$ of certain collections of perverse sheaves on Quasimaps spaces, with factorization isomorphisms. We construct an exact convolution functor from the category of perverse sheaves on affine Grassmannian, constant along Iwahori orbits, to the category $PS$. Conjecturally, this functor should correspond to the restriction functor from modules over quantum group with divided powers to modules over the small quantum group.