Centrality and connectors in Maltsev categories. (Q1771952)

A category \(\mathcal C\) is Maltsev if any reflexive relation in \(\mathcal C\) is an equivalence. The authors define two basic concepts: centrality of equivalence relations and a connector between two binary relations. Applying these concepts, they develop a new approach to the classical property of centrality of equivalence relations. The internal concept of connector allows them to clarify classical results on Maltsev varieties and to extend them to the more general context of regular Maltsev categories. It is proved that Maltsev categories can be characterized in terms of a property of connectors.