Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Polynomial Identities on Algebras with Actions

Chris Plyley, The University of Western Ontario

Abstract

When an algebra is endowed with the additional structure of an action or a grading, one can often make striking conclusions about the algebra based on the properties of the structure-induced subspaces. For example, if A is an associative G-graded algebra such that the homogeneous component A1 satisfies an identity of degree d, then Bergen and Cohen showed that A is itself a PI-algebra. Bahturin, Giambruno and Riley later used combinatorial methods to show that the degree of the identity satisfied by A is bounded above by a function of d and |G|. Utilizing a similar approach, we prove an analogue of this result which applies to associative algebras whose induced Lie or Jordan algebras are G-graded.

Group-gradings and actions by a group of automorphisms are examples of Hopf algebras acting on H-algebras. If H is finite-dimensional, semisimple, commutative, and splits over its base field, then it is known that A is an H-algebra precisely when the H-action on A induces a certain group-grading of A. We extend this duality to incorporate other natural H-actions. To this end, we introduce the notion of an oriented H-algebra. For example, if A has an action by a group of both automorphisms and anti-automorphisms, then A is not an H-algebra, but A is an oriented H-algebra. The vector space gradings associated to oriented H-algebra actions are not generally group-gradings, or even set-gradings. However, when A is a Lie algebra, the grading is a quasigroup-grading, and, when A is an associative algebra, the grading is what we call a Lie-Jordan-grading.

Lastly, we call certain H-polynomials in the free associative H-algebra essential, and show that, if an (associative) H-algebra A satisfies an essential H-identity of degree d, then A satisfies an ordinary identity of bounded degree. Furthermore, in the case when H is m-dimensional, semisimple and commutative, we prove that, if AH satisfies an ordinary identity of degree d, then A satisfies an essential H-identity of degree dm. From this we are able to recover several well-known results as special cases.