Directing modules (Q1186764)

Directing modules play an important role in the representation theory of algebras. They have many good properties, for example, they are determined by their composition factors. Let \(A\) be an Artin algebra. Following \textit{C. M. Ringel} [Tame algebras and integral quadratic forms, (Lect. Notes Math. 1099, 1984; Zbl 0546.16013)], an indecomposable (finitely generated) \(A\)-module \(M\) is called directing if it does not belong to a cycle \(M\to M_ 1 \to ... M_ n=M\) of nonzero nonisomorphisms between indecomposable finitely generated \(A\)-modules. In the reviewed paper the authors show the following nice result: If \(\mathcal C\) is a connected component of the Auslander-Reiten quiver of \(A\), and all modules belonging to \(\mathcal C\) are directing, then \(\mathcal C\) has only finitely many \(DTr\)-orbits, where \(DTr\) is the Auslander-Reiten transformation of \(A\). As a consequence of the main result, they prove that the number of connected components consisting entirely of directing modules is finite. Many other interesting applications of the main result to the structure of a component or to tame representation type are also discussed in the paper.