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We prove a criterion for determining whether the normalization of a complex analytic space on which the constant sheaf is perverse is a rational homology manifold, using a perverse sheaf known as the multiple-point complex. This perverse sheaf is naturally associated to any "parameterized space", and has several interesting connections with the Milnor monodromy and mixed Hodge Modules.

We prove two special cases of a conjecture of J. Fernandez de Bobadilla for hypersurfaces with 1-dimensional critical loci. We do this via a new numerical invariant for such hypersurfaces, called the beta invariant, first defined and explored by the second author in 2014. The beta invariant is an algebraically calculable invariant of the local ambient topological-type of the hypersurface, and the vanishing of the beta invariant is equivalent to the hypotheses of Bobadilla's conjecture.