In universal algebra, an abstract algebra A is called simple if and only if it has no nontrivial congruence relations, or equivalently, if every homomorphism with domain A is either injective or constant.
As congruences on rings are characterized by their ideals, this notion is a straightforward generalization of the notion from ring theory: a ring is simple in the sense that it has no nontrivial ideals if and only if it is simple in the sense of universal algebra. The same remark applies with respect to groups and normal subgroups; hence the universal notion is also a generalization of a simple group (it is a matter of convention whether a one-element algebra should be or should not be considered simple, hence only in this special case the notions might not match).
A theorem by Roberto Magari in 1969 asserts that every variety contains a simple algebra. [1]
In mathematics, a semigroup is an algebraic structure consisting of a set together with an associative internal binary operation on it.
In algebra, the kernel of a homomorphism is generally the inverse image of 0. An important special case is the kernel of a linear map. The kernel of a matrix, also called the null space, is the kernel of the linear map defined by the matrix.
In mathematics, specifically abstract algebra, the isomorphism theorems are theorems that describe the relationship among quotients, homomorphisms, and subobjects. Versions of the theorems exist for groups, rings, vector spaces, modules, Lie algebras, and other algebraic structures. In universal algebra, the isomorphism theorems can be generalized to the context of algebras and congruences.
In abstract algebra, a congruence relation is an equivalence relation on an algebraic structure that is compatible with the structure in the sense that algebraic operations done with equivalent elements will yield equivalent elements. Every congruence relation has a corresponding quotient structure, whose elements are the equivalence classes for the relation.
In mathematics, rings are algebraic structures that generalize fields: multiplication need not be commutative and multiplicative inverses need not exist. Informally, a ring is a set equipped with two binary operations satisfying properties analogous to those of addition and multiplication of integers. Ring elements may be numbers such as integers or complex numbers, but they may also be non-numerical objects such as polynomials, square matrices, functions, and power series.
Algebraic varieties are the central objects of study in algebraic geometry, a sub-field of mathematics. Classically, an algebraic variety is defined as the set of solutions of a system of polynomial equations over the real or complex numbers. Modern definitions generalize this concept in several different ways, while attempting to preserve the geometric intuition behind the original definition.
In algebra, ring theory is the study of rings, algebraic structures in which addition and multiplication are defined and have similar properties to those operations defined for the integers. Ring theory studies the structure of rings; their representations, or, in different language, modules; special classes of rings ; related structures like rngs; as well as an array of properties that prove to be of interest both within the theory itself and for its applications, such as homological properties and polynomial identities.
In mathematics, a module is a generalization of the notion of vector space in which the field of scalars is replaced by a ring. The concept of a module also generalizes the notion of an abelian group, since the abelian groups are exactly the modules over the ring of integers.
In mathematics, a quotient algebra is the result of partitioning the elements of an algebraic structure using a congruence relation. Quotient algebras are also called factor algebras. Here, the congruence relation must be an equivalence relation that is additionally compatible with all the operations of the algebra, in the formal sense described below. Its equivalence classes partition the elements of the given algebraic structure. The quotient algebra has these classes as its elements, and the compatibility conditions are used to give the classes an algebraic structure.
In mathematics, in particular algebraic geometry, a moduli space is a geometric space whose points represent algebro-geometric objects of some fixed kind, or isomorphism classes of such objects. Such spaces frequently arise as solutions to classification problems: If one can show that a collection of interesting objects can be given the structure of a geometric space, then one can parametrize such objects by introducing coordinates on the resulting space. In this context, the term "modulus" is used synonymously with "parameter"; moduli spaces were first understood as spaces of parameters rather than as spaces of objects. A variant of moduli spaces is formal moduli. Bernhard Riemann first used the term "moduli" in 1857.
In mathematics, particularly in algebra, the class of projective modules enlarges the class of free modules over a ring, keeping some of the main properties of free modules. Various equivalent characterizations of these modules appear below.
In abstract algebra, a branch of mathematics, a simple ring is a non-zero ring that has no two-sided ideal besides the zero ideal and itself. In particular, a commutative ring is a simple ring if and only if it is a field.
In mathematical order theory, an ideal is a special subset of a partially ordered set (poset). Although this term historically was derived from the notion of a ring ideal of abstract algebra, it has subsequently been generalized to a different notion. Ideals are of great importance for many constructions in order and lattice theory.
Algebraic K-theory is a subject area in mathematics with connections to geometry, topology, ring theory, and number theory. Geometric, algebraic, and arithmetic objects are assigned objects called K-groups. These are groups in the sense of abstract algebra. They contain detailed information about the original object but are notoriously difficult to compute; for example, an important outstanding problem is to compute the K-groups of the integers.
In mathematics, Stone's representation theorem for Boolean algebras states that every Boolean algebra is isomorphic to a certain field of sets. The theorem is fundamental to the deeper understanding of Boolean algebra that emerged in the first half of the 20th century. The theorem was first proved by Marshall H. Stone. Stone was led to it by his study of the spectral theory of operators on a Hilbert space.
In universal algebra, a variety of algebras or equational class is the class of all algebraic structures of a given signature satisfying a given set of identities. For example, the groups form a variety of algebras, as do the abelian groups, the rings, the monoids etc. According to Birkhoff's theorem, a class of algebraic structures of the same signature is a variety if and only if it is closed under the taking of homomorphic images, subalgebras, and (direct) products. In the context of category theory, a variety of algebras, together with its homomorphisms, forms a category; these are usually called finitary algebraic categories.
In mathematics, the term simple is used to describe an algebraic structure which in some sense cannot be divided by a smaller structure of the same type. Put another way, an algebraic structure is simple if the kernel of every homomorphism is either the whole structure or a single element. Some examples are:
In mathematics, the congruence lattice problem asks whether every algebraic distributive lattice is isomorphic to the congruence lattice of some other lattice. The problem was posed by Robert P. Dilworth, and for many years it was one of the most famous and long-standing open problems in lattice theory; it had a deep impact on the development of lattice theory itself. The conjecture that every distributive lattice is a congruence lattice is true for all distributive lattices with at most ℵ1 compact elements, but F. Wehrung provided a counterexample for distributive lattices with ℵ2 compact elements using a construction based on Kuratowski's free set theorem.
In mathematics, especially in the fields of universal algebra and graph theory, a graph algebra is a way of giving a directed graph an algebraic structure. It was introduced by McNulty and Shallon, and has seen many uses in the field of universal algebra since then.
In mathematics, a noncommutative ring is a ring whose multiplication is not commutative; that is, there exist a and b in the ring such that ab and ba are different. Equivalently, a noncommutative ring is a ring that is not a commutative ring.