Traces on ideals in pivotal categories (Q1932688)

Let \(\Bbbk\) be a commutative ring. The paper provides a systematic approach to defining traces on ideals in a pivotal \(\Bbbk\)-category \(\mathcal{C}\). It is shown that left (right) ambidextrous traces on a class of objects \(\mathcal{O}\) of \(\mathcal{C}\) bijectively correspond to left (right) traces on the left (right) ideal generated by \(\mathcal{O}\). Similarly, the spherical traces on a class of objects bijectively correspond to traces on the ideal generated by the class. The authors associate to a one-sided trace \(t\) on a one-sided ideal an isotopy invariant of spherical \(A\)-colored ribbon graphs, where \(A\) is a a certain class of objects defined by \(t\). The paper ends with a characterization of \(A\) in terms of the slope, in the particular case where the one-sided ideal is the ideal of projective objects of \(\mathcal{C}\).