Singular covers in free lattices (Q1078215)

Let L be any lattice, a, b elements of L. a is a singular cover of b iff (i) a covers b and (ii) a is join-irreducible and b is meet-irreducible. The present paper describes the singular covers in FL(X), the free lattice on a set X of generators. Theorem: If w is a singular cover of v in FL(X), then either v is the join of two distinct atoms or w is the meet of two distinct coatoms of FL(X). This result has been obtained by Ježek and Slavík for FL(3); the present paper contains a sketch of their proof. The extension to arbitrary FL(X) is due to Freese and Nation. Their proof, given in full, is rather different from that for FL(3), it rests heavily on the machinery developed by \textit{R. Freese} [in: Universal Algebra and Lattice Theory, Lect. Notes Math. 1149, 82-93 (1985; Zbl 0568.06004)] and \textit{R. Freese} and \textit{J. B. Nation} [Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 288, 1-42 (1985; Zbl 0567.06008)].