RESEARCH SYNOPSIS Miodrag Cristian Iovanov
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Research Synopsis M.C.Iovanov RESEARCH SYNOPSIS Miodrag Cristian Iovanov (In this text, all references are made to the papers in my publication list) My research interests are in representation theory, Hopf Algebras and quantum groups, tensor categories, category theory and homological algebra, algebraic topology. My PhD thesis was in 2009 from SUNY Buffalo, under the advisement of the late Samuel D. Schack. I. Representation theory of algebras and coalgebras [4],[11],[16],[17],[19],[20],[21],[22] Let A be a K-algebra. In the studies of the properties of A, one is often lead to considering (the category of) finite dimensional representations of A. In general, this category does not have ”enough” injective or projective objects, and one is sometimes lead to considering the category Ind(Rep(A)) whose objects are colimits of finite dimensional A-representations. Such A-modules which are sums of their finite dimensional submodules are sometimes called rational modules. This leads one naturally to the introduction of coalgebras and their comodules: the category of rational left A-modules is equivalent to the category of comodules over the representative coalgebra R(A), also called the finite dual of A. This coalgebra consists of all linear maps f : A → K such that ker(f) contains an ideal of finite codimension, n equivalently, there are finite families (gi)i=1,...,n, (hi)i=1,...,n such that f(xy)= P gi(x)hi(y). Here, gi, hi i=1 are again representative functions, and this allows the introduction of a ”coassociative” comultiplication n ∆ : R(A) → R(A) ⊗ R(A) by ∆(f) = P gi ⊗ hi which is well defined. Another motivation for the i=1 study of coalgebras is the following observation of Takeuchy, which characterizes linear categories which ”behave” like the category of rational modules over an algebra A. If a linear category C, which has directed colimits, is generated by objects of finite length and hom(S, S) is finite dimensional for S simple (i.e. C is a linear category of finite type), then C is equivalent to the category of right comodules MC over a coalgebra C. Furthermore, if both an algebra and a coalgebra structure are simultaneously present on a vector space B and they are compatible, i.e. one has a bialgebra B, then the category of B-comodules (and also that of finite dimensional B-modules) has a tensor product, i.e. it is monoidal. Thus, in such a situation, one can employ methods similar to those from the representation theory of groups. Hopf algebras are bialgebras with a map S : H → H called antipode, satisfying certain compatibility conditions; S plays the role of the inversion of elements in groups. Given a coalgebra C, its linear dual C∗ is a topological algebra with the so called ”finite topology”, and has a basis of neighborhoods for 0 consisting of cofinite ideals. It is complete and separated under this topology (pseudo-compact algebra), and it is also a profinite algebra. Such algebras can be thought as the algebra analogues of profinite groups. The category of right C-comodules is naturally identified with that of rational left C∗-modules, and thus it is often useful to consider C∗ in the study of C. Part of my research is concerned with corepresentation theory (or infinite dimensional rational represen- tation theory), more precisely, properties of categories of comodules. One important class of properties is Frobenius type properties. A category is Frobenius if it has enough injectives and projectives and the two classes coincide. Historically, this notion emerged from the work of Frobenius. In modular represen- tation theory, when the characteristic of K divides |G|, the group algebra KG is no longer semisimple but it is Frobenius, i.e. KG is isomorphic to its dual as left or as right modules (representations). Such ∗ an algebra A for which A =∼ A as left (or equivalently, right) modules is called a Frobenius algebra; such an algebra is always finite dimensional. This concept was extended and dualized for coalgebras: a coalgebra is left (right) co-Frobenius if C embeds in C∗ as left (right) C∗-module. This concept is not symmetric, and such coalgebras can be infinite dimensional; a finite dimensional coalgebra is left or right co-Frobenius if and only if C∗ is Frobenius. The concept is also motivated by the following: a Hopf Page 1 Research Synopsis M.C.Iovanov algebra is left or right co-Frobenius if and only if it has a non-zero integral. Such Hopf algebras are a generalization and a quantization of algebras of representative functions of a compact group, and can thus be thought of as compact quantum groups. Indeed, if G is a compact group, the left Haar integral restricted to the algebra R(G) of continuous representative functions on G is an integral in the Hopf algebraic sense. A coalgebra is left (right) quasi-Frobenius if C embeds in a coproduct power of C∗ as left (right) C∗-modules. My research provides new understanding and interpretations of these notions. I showed in [4] that the left and right co-Frobenius coalgebras can be understood as coalgebras which are isomorphic to their rational dual as left, or equivalently, as right comodules. This together with categorical consequences, shows that this can indeed be understood as not only a mere dualization, but the right symmetric generalization of the Frobenius algebras. Moreover, in [17], I showed that a similar result can be proved about quasi-co- Frobenius (QCF) coalgebras, that left and right QCF is equivalent to C being weakly isomorphic to its rational (left or right) dual (in the sense that some countable coproduct powers are isomorphic). One of the results of [16] shows that further the left and right QCF coalgebras are exactly those coalgebras for which the category of right (equivalently, that of left) comodules is a Frobenius category. These allowed us to introduce a new generalized Frobenius algebra concept in [17]: a topological algebra A with a topology of algebraic type (basis of 0 consisting of cofinite ideals) is Frobenius if A is isomorphic to its complete dual A∨ as left (equivalently, right) A-modules. A is Frobenius if and only if it is the dual of a co-Frobenius coalgebra, and such an algebra is always profinite. This further motivates and explains the theory of generalized Frobenius algebras and co-Frobenius coalgebras. Also, we showed in [16] that co-Frobenius coalgebras are close to Hopf algebras from another perspective too, that is, there is a theory of integrals. This takes the form of an ”integral” functor hom(C, −) on finite dimensional comodules. It is shown that the existence and uniqueness of integrals - i.e. dim hom(C,M) = dim(M) for all f.d. M’s - is equivalent to C being co-Frobenius; this extends results from Hopf algebras, where existence of integrals implies uniqueness and is equivalent to the Frobenius property. These generalized integrals have concrete interesting interpretations for compact groups as certain quantum invariant vector valued integrals R with a ”quantum invariance” with respect to a representation η of G: R a · fdx = η(a) · R f. Other results concern connections between injective/projective and generator/cogenerator conditions. For a ring A, the properties of being left self-injective and left or right cogenerator does not imply each other, while for finite dimensional algebras they do. For the infinite dimensional case, i.e. for coalgebras and their comodules, it was known that if C is projective in MC (equivalently, C is left QCF) implies that C is a generator for left comodules, but it was unknown if the converse holds. The results of [11] completely solve this problem and show that in this is true if and only if indecomposable injectives have finite Loewy length, and in general, it is false; the examples constructed prove that any coalgebra C can be embedded in a coalgebra D which is a generator for MD. This example is constructed by an infinite process in which at each step, using a certain matrix extension, a new coalgebra is formed containing the previous one and which ”generates” all the f.d. representations of the previous one. Another direction of results involves representations of combinatorial objects such as quivers and PO sets, and related notions, such as quiver algebras and path coalgebras. In [21] the one sided serial coalgebras (i.e. coalgebras which decompose as a direct sum of uniserial modules each of which have a unique composition series) over an algebraically closed field are classified; they are the support for serial linear categories of finite type. These coalgebras are constructed by some combinatorial data: are embedded in quiver Γ which is obtained by attaching trees at the vertices of a cycle, depend on a family of paths (pv)v where for each vertex v, pv is a path ending at v. Also, the representation theory of (left and right) serial coalgebras is developed. It is shown that this is very close and parallel to the theory of infinite abelian primary groups. It is shown that for such a linear category - MC over a serial coalgebra, every object decomposes into a direct sum of indecomposables if and only if injective indecomposables in MC have finite length. Also, the indecomposable objects are precisely the indecomposable injectives and the terms of their Loewy series. As a consequence, it is shown that it is possible that over an algebra A all Page 2 Research Synopsis M.C.Iovanov right rational modules decompose as direct sum of indecomposable modules (even uniserial), while not all left rational modules decompose as such; this is the quiver algebra of the right infinite line A∞.