Homomorphisms, ideals and commutativity in the Stone-Čech compactification of a discrete semigroup (Q1917064)

Let \(S\) be a countable discrete abelian and cancellative semigroup and let \(\beta S\) be the Stone-Čech compactification of \(S\), turned into a semigroup by extending the semigroup operation \(+\) of \(S\) to \(\beta S\), so that the extension is continuous in the left variable, i.e., the translations \(x\mapsto x+s\colon S\to S\) are continuous. As usual, \(S\) is identified with the corresponding subsemigroup of \(S\). This situation, in particular the special cases \(S=(\mathbb N,+)\), \(S=(\mathbb N,\cdot)\), and \(S=\mathbb Z\) have been extensively studied in the literature, in various contexts. In the paper under review, the authors extend and enlarge some of the known results concerning the ideal and the idempotent structure, and the non-existence of self-copies. Other, very interesting results concern homomorphisms between semigroups of this type. Among other things, these allow simple proofs for statements like the following: every continuous injective mapping \(\beta T\to \beta S\) is induced by some injective homomorphism \(T\to S\).