Intermediate rings (Q1897801)

This is the fifth paper in the authors' series on the theme of integral closure and ramification of prime ideals in infinite algebraic field extensions. The first part includes a ring version of the structure theorem on the integral closure of a noetherian domain in a finite algebraic extension of its quotient field. A quasilocal domain \(R\) is called firm if there is no quasilocal domain \(S \neq R\) which dominates \(R\) and is separable algebraic, integral, unramified, and unresiduated over \(R\). Also, \(R\) is called supermultifirm if whenever \(R\) is unramified in a separable algebraic field extension \(L\) of the quotient field \(K\) of \(R\) we have \(R\) fully residuated in every finite algebraic field extension \(L'\) of \(K\) with \(L'\subset L\). The heart of the paper concerns these and two other firmness conditions. In particular, for \(R\) dominated by a local ring, if \(R\) is normal then it is firm and supermultifirm. The final part connects the firmness conditions with Zariski's main theorem. This involves the posing of several questions concerning possible generalisations of results of the authors from J. Algebra 170, No. 3, 861-879 (1994; Zbl 0832.13008).