Finitary simple Lie algebras (Q1306840)

Let \(V\) be a vector space over a field \(F\). A subalgebra of \({\mathfrak {gl}}(V)\) is called finitary if it consists of finite-rank transformations. The main theorem presents a classification of infinite dimensional central finitary simple Lie algebras over \(F\) in the case of characteristic zero. There turn out to be only four families in the classification: a finitary special linear algebra, a finitary special unitary algebra, a finitary orthogonal algebra, and a finitary symplectic algebra. All depend, among other things, on a finite dimensional division \(F\)-algebra, \(\Delta\). In the special case of \(F\) algebraically closed, this theorem specializes to the author's previous result that any finitary simple Lie algebra of infinite countable dimension is isomorphic to \({\mathfrak {sl}}_{\infty}(F)\), \({\mathfrak o}_{\infty}(F)\), or \({\mathfrak {sp}}_{\infty}(F)\). In the special case of \(F={\mathbb R}\), the author also carries out the complete classification. The ones with countable dimension fall into seven families: \({\mathfrak {sl}}_{\infty}({\mathbb R})\), \({\mathfrak o}_{\infty}({\mathbb R},k)\), \({\mathfrak {sp}}_{\infty}({\mathbb R})\), \({\mathfrak {su}}_{\infty}({\mathbb C},k)\), \({\mathfrak {sl}}_{\infty}({\mathbb H})\), \({\mathfrak o}_{\infty}({\mathbb H},k)\), or \({\mathfrak {sp}}_{\infty}({\mathbb H})\) where \(k=0,1,\ldots,\infty\).