Inverse semigroups determined by their bundles of correspondences (Q1123273)

A correspondence on a semigroup \(S\) means any subsemigroup of \(S\times S\) (including the empty one) and the set of all correspondences on \(S\) is denoted by \({\mathcal C}(S)\). The bundle of correspondences of \(S\) is (\({\mathcal C}(S),\circ,^{-1},\subseteq)\) where \(\circ\) denotes composition of binary relations, \(^{-1}\) denotes the natural involution of taking the inverse, \(\rho^{-1}\), of a correspondence \(\rho\) of \(S\) and \(\subseteq\) denotes set inclusion. Two semigroups \(S\) and \(T\) are called \(\mathcal C\)-isomorphic if there is a \(\mathcal C\)-isomorphism of \(\mathcal C(S)\) upon \(\mathcal C(T)\). The author is concerned with the problem of finding \(\mathcal C\)-determined semigroups, that is semigroups \(S\) with the property that if \(\mathcal C(S)\) is \(\mathcal C\)-isomorphic to \(\mathcal C(T)\) (\(T\) an arbitrary semigroup) then \(T\) is isomorphic to \(S\) or its dual. The main result is that any fundamental inverse semigroup is \(\mathcal C\)-determined (an inverse semigroup is fundamental if it has no non-trivial idempotent separating congruence). The condition that \(S\) be fundamental cannot be dropped as there are finite solvable groups known not to be \(\mathcal C\)-determined. Some other \(\mathcal C\)-determined classes of nonperiodic semilattices of cancellative monoids are discovered.