The structure of countably generated projective modules over regular rings (Q1974169)

New techniques are introduced to analyze countably generated projective modules over a (von Neumann) regular ring \(R\). The category of such modules is equivalent to the category of finitely generated projective modules over the endomorphism ring \(E\) of the countable rank free module \(R^{(\omega)}\), and \(E\) can be identified with the ring of column-finite \(\omega\times\omega\) matrices over \(R\). Let \(B\) denote the subring of \(E\) consisting of row- and column-finite matrices. The authors prove that the respective monoids \(V(B)\) and \(V(E)\) (consisting of isomorphism classes of finitely generated projective modules) are isomorphic. Although neither \(B\) nor \(E\) is regular, \(B\) can be viewed as the multiplier ring of the ideal of matrices with only finitely many nonzero entries. Since this ideal is regular, the first and third authors' analysis of multiplier rings of non-unital regular rings [Commun. Algebra 28, No. 7, 3359-3385 (2000)] can be applied. For example, it is proved that when \(R\) is unit-regular, the monoid \(W(R)\) of isomorphism classes of countably generated projective \(R\)-modules is isomorphic to the monoid of countably generated hereditary upward-directed subsets of \(V(R)\). In the case that \(R\) is additionally simple, non-Artinian, and strictly unperforated, a precise description of \(W(R)\) is given in terms of \(V(R)\) and lower semicontinuous affine functions on the space of pseudo-rank functions on \(R\). In the latter part of the paper, the techniques mentioned above are used to analyze projective modules and ideals for regular rings \(R\) satisfying \(2\)-comparability (for any \(x,y\in R\), either \(xR\) embeds in \(yR\oplus yR\), or \(yR\) embeds in \(xR\oplus xR\)). For instance, when \(R\) is simple the monoid \(W(R)\) is obtained from \(V(R)\) by adjoining either a single infinity element or a copy of the extended line \((0,\infty]\). When dealing with countably generated projective \(R\)-modules \(P\) and \(Q\) in the general case, the previous result is applied to simple factor rings of corner rings \(eRe\) inside the trace ideals of \(P\) and \(Q\). For example, it is proved that one of \(P\) or \(Q\) embeds in the other except possibly when they have the same trace ideal and are finitely generated modulo the unique maximal sub-ideal of this trace ideal; in any case, either \(P\) embeds in \(Q\oplus Q\) or \(Q\) embeds in \(P\oplus P\). In the final section of the paper, the authors derive a structure theory for directly finite countably generated projective \(R\)-modules. As a corollary, they obtain that the direct sum of any two such modules is again directly finite. This corollary has also been proved, independently and with different methods, by \textit{M. Kutami} [Commun. Algebra 27, No. 6, 2917-2933 (1999; Zbl 0944.16009)].