Posts tagged coalgebras

Pollock your own noncommutative space

May 19th

I really like Matilde Marcolli’s idea to use some of Jackson Pollock’s paintings as metaphors for noncommutative spaces. In her talk she used this painting

and refered to it (as did I in my post) as : Jackson Pollock “Untitled N.3”. Before someone writes a post ‘The Pollock noncommutative space hoax’ (similar to my own post) let me point out that I am well aware of the controversy surrounding this painting.

This painting is among 32 works recently discovered and initially attributed to Pollock. In fact, I’ve already told part of the story in Doodles worth millions (or not)? (thanks to PD1). The story involves the people on the right : from left to right, Jackson Pollock, his wife Lee Krasner, Mercedes Matter and her son Alex Matter.

Alex Matter, whose father, Herbert, and mother, Mercedes, were artists and friends of Jackson Pollock, discovered after his mother died a group of small drip paintings in a storage locker in Wainscott, N.Y. which he believed to be authentic Pollocks.

Read the post mentioned above if you want to know how mathematics screwed up his plan, or much better, reed the article Anatomy of the Jackson Pollock controversy by Stephen Litt.

So, perhaps the painting above was not the smartest choice, but we could take any other genuine Pollock ‘drip-painting’, a technique he taught himself towards the end of 1946 to make an image by splashing, pouring, sloshing colors onto the canvas. Typically, such a painting consists of blops of paint, connected via thin drip-lines.

What does this have to do with noncommutative geometry? Well, consider the blops as ‘points’. In commutative geometry, distinct points cannot share tangent information¹. In the noncommutative world though, they can!, or if you want to phrase it like this, noncommutative points ‘can talk to each other’. And, that’s what we cherish in those drip-lines.

But then, if two points share common tangent informations, they must be awfully close to each other… so one might imagine these Pollock-lines to be strings holding these points together. Hence, it would make more sense to consider the ‘Pollock-quotient-painting’, that is, the space one gets after dividing out the relation ‘connected by drip-lines’².

For this reason, my own mental picture of a genuinely noncommutative space ³ looks more like the picture below

The colored blops you see are really sets of points which you might view as, say, a FacebookGroup⁴. Some chatter may occur between two distinct FacebookGroups, the more chatter the thicker the connection depicted⁵. Now, there are some tiny isolated spots (say blue ones in the upper right-hand quadrant). These should really be looked at as remote clusters of noncommutative points (sharing no (tangent) information whatsoever with the blops in the foregound). If we would zoom into them beyond the Planck scale (if I’m allowed to say a bollock-word in a Pollock-post) they might reveal again a whole universe similar to the interconnected blops upfront.

The picture was produced using the fabulous Pollock engine. Just use your mouse to draw and click to change colors in order to produce your very own noncommutative space!

For the mathematicians still around, this may sound like a lot of Pollock-bollocks but can be made precise. See my note Noncommutative geometry and dual coalgebras for a very terse reading. Now that coalgebras are gaining popularity, I really should write a more readable account of it, including some fanshi-wanshi examples…

technically : a commutative semi-local ring splits as the direct sum of local rings and this does no longer hold for a noncommutative semi-local ring [↩]
my guess is that Matilde thinks of the lines as the action of a group on the points giving a topological horrible quotient space, and thats precisely where noncommutative geometry shines [↩]
that is, the variety corresponding to a huge noncommutative algebra such as free algebras, group algebras of arithmetic groups or fundamental groups [↩]
technically, think of them as the connected components of isomorphism classes of finite dimensional simple representations of your favorite noncommutative algebra [↩]
technically, the size of the connection is the dimension of the ext-group between generic simples in the components [↩]

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arxiv, coalgebras, geometry, groups, Marcolli, noncommutative, paintings, representations, simples

noncommutative F_un geometry (2)

Oct 17th

Posted by lievenlb in geometry

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Last time we tried to generalize the Connes-Consani approach to commutative algebraic geometry over the field with one element $\mathbb{F}_1$ to the noncommutative world by considering covariant functors

$N~:~\wis{groups} \rightarrow \wis{sets}$

which over $\C$ resp. $\Z$ become visible by a complex (resp. integral) algebra having suitable universal properties.

However, we didn’t specify what we meant by a complex noncommutative variety (resp. an integral noncommutative scheme). In particular, we claimed that the $\mathbb{F}_1$ -’points’ associated to the functor

$D~:~\wis{groups} \rightarrow \wis{sets} \qquad G \mapsto G_2 \times G_3$ (here G_n denotes all elements of order of )

were precisely the modular dessins d’enfants of Grothendieck, but didn’t give details. We’ll try to do this now.

For algebras over a field we follow the definition, due to Kontsevich and Soibelman, of so called “noncommutative thin schemes”. Actually, the thinness-condition is implicit in both Soule’s-approach as that of Connes and Consani : we do not consider R-points in general, but only those of rings R which are finite and flat over our basering (or field).

So, what is a noncommutative thin scheme anyway? Well, its a covariant functor (commuting with finite projective limits)

$\mathbb{X}~:~\wis{Alg}^{fd}_k \rightarrow \wis{sets}$

from finite-dimensional (possibly noncommutative) -algebras to sets. Now, the usual dual-space operator gives an anti-equivalence of categories

$\wis{Alg}^{fd}_k \leftrightarrow \wis{Coalg}^{fd}_k \qquad A=C^* \leftrightarrow C=A^*$

so a thin scheme can also be viewed as a contra-variant functor (commuting with finite direct limits)

$\mathbb{X}~:~\wis{Coalg}^{fd}_k \rightarrow \wis{Sets}$

In particular, we are interested to associated to any {tex]k[/tex]-algebra its representation functor :

$\wis{rep}(A)~:~\wis{Coalg}^{fd}_k \rightarrow \wis{Sets} \qquad C \mapsto Alg_k(A,C^*)$

This may look strange at first sight, but C^* is a finite dimensional algebra and any -dimensional representation of is an algebra map $A \rightarrow M_n(k)$ and we take to be the dual coalgebra of this image.

Kontsevich and Soibelman proved that every noncommutative thin scheme $\mathbb{X}$ is representable by a -coalgebra. That is, there exists a unique coalgebra $C_{\mathbb{X}}$ (which they call the coalgebra of ‘distributions’ of $\mathbb{X}$ ) such that for every finite dimensional -algebra we have

$\mathbb{X}(B) = Coalg_k(B^*,C_{\mathbb{X}})$

In the case of interest to us, that is for the functor $\wis{rep}(A)$ the coalgebra of distributions is Kostant’s dual coalgebra A^o . This is the not the full linear dual of but contains only those linear functionals on which factor through a finite dimensional quotient.

So? You’ve exchanged an algebra for some coalgebra A^o , but where’s the geometry in all this? Well, let’s look at the commutative case. Suppose $A= \C[X]$ is the coordinate ring of a smooth affine variety , then its dual coalgebra looks like

$\C[X]^o = \oplus_{x \in X} U(T_x(X))$

the direct sum of all universal (co)algebras of tangent spaces at points $x \in X$ . But how do we get the variety out of this? Well, any coalgebra has a coradical (being the sun of all simple subcoalgebras) and in the case just mentioned we have

$corad(\C[X]^o) = \oplus_{x \in X} \C e_x$

so every point corresponds to a unique simple component of the coradical. In the general case, the coradical of the dual coalgebra A^o is the direct sum of all simple finite dimensional representations of . That is, the direct summands of the coalgebra give us a noncommutative variety whose points are the simple representations, and the remainder of the coalgebra of distributions accounts for infinitesimal information on these points (as do the tangent spaces in the commutative case).

In fact, it was a surprise to me that one can describe the dual coalgebra quite explicitly, and that $A_{\infty}$ -structures make their appearance quite naturally. See this paper if you’re in for the details on this.

That settles the problem of what we mean by the noncommutative variety associated to a complex algebra. But what about the integral case? In the above, we used extensively the theory of Kostant-duality which works only for algebras over fields…

Well, not quite. In the case of $\Z$ (or more general, of Dedekind domains) one can repeat Kostant’s proof word for word provided one takes as the definition of the dual $\Z$ -coalgebra of an algebra (which is $\Z$ -torsion free)

$A^o = \{ f~:~A \rightarrow \Z~:~A/Ker(f)~\text{is finitely generated and torsion free}~\}$

(over general rings there may be also variants of this duality, as in Street’s book an Quantum groups). Probably lots of people have come up with this, but the only explicit reference I have is to the first paper I’ve ever written. So, also for algebras over $\Z$ we can define a suitable noncommutative integral scheme (the coradical approach accounts only for the maximal ideals rather than all primes, but somehow this is implicit in all approaches as we consider only thin schemes).

Fine! So, we can make sense of the noncommutative geometrical objects corresponding to the group-algebras $\C \Gamma$ and $\Z \Gamma$ where $\Gamma = PSL_2(\Z)$ is the modular group (the algebras corresponding to the $G \mapsto G_2 \times G_3$ -functor). But, what might be the points of the noncommutative scheme corresponding to $\mathbb{F}_1 \Gamma$ ???

Well, let’s continue the path cut out before. “Points” should correspond to finite dimensional “simple representations”. Hence, what are the finite dimensional simple $\mathbb{F}_1$ -representations of $\Gamma$ ? (Or, for that matter, of any group )

Here we come back to Javier’s post on this : a finite dimensional $\mathbb{F}_1$ -vectorspace is a finite set. A $\Gamma$ -representation on this set (of n-elements) is a group-morphism

$\Gamma \rightarrow GL_n(\mathbb{F}_1) = S_n$

hence it gives a permutation representation of $\Gamma$ on this set. But then, if finite dimensional $\mathbb{F}_1$ -representations of $\Gamma$ are the finite permutation representations, then the simple ones are the transitive permutation representations. That is, the points of the noncommutative scheme corresponding to $\mathbb{F}_1 \Gamma$ are the conjugacy classes of subgroups $H \subset \Gamma$ such that $\Gamma/H$ is finite. But these are exactly the modular dessins d’enfants introduced by Grothendieck as I explained a while back elsewhere (see for example this post and others in the same series).

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arxiv, coalgebras, Connes, Dedekind, geometry, google, Grothendieck, groups, Kontsevich, modular, noncommutative, permutation representation, representations

F_un with Manin

Sep 10th

Posted by lievenlb in geometry

9 comments

Fun with F_un

Amidst all LHC-noise, Yuri I. Manin arXived today an interesting paper Cyclotomy and analytic geometry over $\mathbb{F}_1$ .

The paper gives a nice survey of the existent literature and focusses on the crucial role of roots of unity in the algebraic geometry over the non-existent field with one element $\mathbb{F}_1$ (in French called ‘F-un’). I have tried to do a couple of posts on F-un some time ago but now realize, reading Manin’s paper, I may have given up way too soon…

At several places in the paper, Manin hints at a possible noncommutative geometry over $\mathbb{F}_1$ :

This is the appropriate place to stress that in a wider context of Toen-Vaqui ‘Au-dessous de Spec Z’, or eventually in noncommutative $\mathbb{F}_1$ -geometry, teh spectrum of $\mathbb{F}_1$ loses its privileged position as a final object of a geometric category. For example, in noncommutative geometry, or in an appropriate category of stacks, the quotient of this spectrum modulo the trivial action of a group must lie below this spectrum.
Soule’s algebras $\mathcal{A}_X$ are a very important element of the structure, in particular, because they form a bridge to Arakelov geometry. Soule uses concrete choices of them in order to produce ‘just right’ supply of morphisms, without a priori constraining these choices formally. In this work, we use these algebras and their version also to pave a way to the analytic (and possibly non-commutative) geometry over $\mathbb{F}_1$ .

Back when I was writing the first batch of F-un posts, I briefly contemplated the possibility of a noncommutative geometry over $\mathbb{F}_1$ , but quickly forgot about it because I thought it would be forced to reduce to commutative geometry.

Here is the quick argument : noncommutative geometry is really the study of coalgebras (see for example my paper or if you prefer more trustworthy sources the Kontsevich-Soibelman paper). Now, unless I made a mistake, I think all coalgebras over $\mathbb{F}_1$ must be co-commutative (even group-like), so reducing to commutative geometry.

Surely, I’m missing something…

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arxiv, coalgebras, geometry, Kontsevich, Manin, non-commutative, noncommutative

neverendingbooks-geometry

Jun 12th

Posted by lievenlb in geometry

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Here a list of saved pdf-files of previous NeverEndingBooks-posts on geometry in reverse chronological order.

More >

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anabelian, arxiv, coalgebras, Connes, geometry, Jacobian, Klein, Manin, Marcolli, noncommutative, rationality, Riemann, topology

coalgebras and non-geometry 3

Sep 11th

Posted by lievenlb in geometry

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Last time we saw that the coalgebra of distributions of a noncommutative manifold can be described as a coalgebra Takeuchi-equivalent to the path coalgebra of a huge quiver. This infinite quiver has as its vertices the isomorphism classes of finite dimensional simple representations of the qurve A (the coordinate ring of the noncommutative manifold) and there are as many directed arrows between the vertices corresponding to the simples S and T as is the dimension of Ext^1_A(S,T) .

The fact that this coalgebra of distributions is equivalent to the path coalgebra of some quiver is in the Kontsevich-Soibelman paper though it would have been nice if they had given reference for this fact to the paper Wedge Products and Cotensor Coalgebras in Monoidal Categories by Ardizzoni or to previous work by P. Jara, D. Llena, L. Merino and D. Stefan, “Hereditary and formally smooth coalgebras”, Algebr. Represent. Theory 8 (2005), 363-374. In those papers it is shown that a coalgebra with coseparable coradical is hereditary if and only if it is formally smooth if and only if it is a cotensor coalgebra of some bicomodule.

At first this looks just like the dual version of the classical result that a finite dimensional hereditary algebra is Morita equivalent to the path algebra of a quiver (which is indeed what the proof does) but again the condition that the coradical is coseparable does not require the coradical to be finite dimensional… In our case, the coradical is indeed coseparable being the direct sum over all matrix coalgebras corresponding to the simple representations. Hence, we can again recover the _points of our noncommutative manifold from the direct summands of the coradical. Fortunately, one can compute this huge coalgebra of distributions from a small quiver, the one quiver to rule them all, but as I’ve been babbling about all of this here numerous times I’ll let the interested find out for themselves how you use it (a) to get at the isoclasses of all simples (hint : morally they are the smooth points of the quotient varieties of n-dimensional representations and enough tools have been developed recently to spot some fake simples, that is smooth proper semi-simple points) and (b) to compute the ragball, that is the huge quiver with vertex set the simples and arows as described above. Over the years I’ve calculated several one-quivers for a variety of qurves (such as amalgamated free products of finite groups and smooth curves). If you are in for a puzzle, try to determine it for the qurve $~(\mathbb{C}[x] \ast C_2) \ast_{\mathbb{C} C_2} \mathbb{C} PSL_2(\mathbb{Z}) \ast_{\mathbb{C} C_3} (\mathbb{C}[x] \ast C_3)$ The answer is a mysterious hexagon

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coalgebras, geometry, groups, Kontsevich, noncommutative, puzzle, quivers, representations, simples

Posts tagged coalgebras

Pollock your own noncommutative space

noncommutative F_un geometry (2)

F_un with Manin

Fun with F_un

neverendingbooks-geometry

coalgebras and non-geometry 3

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Pollock your own noncommutative space

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F_un with Manin

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coalgebras and non-geometry 3

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