Essential-normal extensions of regular semigroups (Q1070351)

A full regular subsemigroup S' of a regular semigroup S is 'normal' if for each element x of S, and inverse x' of x, xS'x'\(\subseteq S\). The extension is 'essential' if the identity congruence on S is the only congruence whose restriction to S' is the identity. Via the notion of an 'inductive groupoid' the authors construct a 'normal hull' \(\Phi\) (S) for any regular semigroup S: there is an idempotent-separating homomorphism \(\phi\) : \(S\to \Phi (S)\) such that \(\phi\) (S) is normal in \(\Phi\) (S). If the 'metacentre' of S (the kernel of this homomorphism) is idempotent then \(\Phi\) (S) is the maximum essential normal extension of S. This normal hull generalizes that for inverse semigroups (see \textit{M. Petrich} [''Inverse Semigroups'' (1984; Zbl 0546.20053)]) and ultimately the automorphism group of a group. [Reviewer's remark. Recently \textit{F. Pastijn} and \textit{M. Petrich} [''Regular semigroups as extensions'', Res. Notes Math. 136 (1985)] have used different methods to construct the normal hull of a regular semigroup. They also proved the converse of the theorem cited above: if S has a maximum essential normal extension then the metacentre of S is idempotent.]