The fake monster formal group (Q1974954)

We cite from the author's introduction: The main result of this paper is the construction of ``good'' integral forms for the universal enveloping algebras of the fake monster Lie algebra and the Virasoro algebra. As an application, we construct formal group laws over the integers for these Lie algebras. We also prove a form of the no-ghost theorem over the integers and use this to verify an assumption used in the proof of the modular moonshine conjectures. Over the integers, the universal enveloping algebra of a Lie algebra is not very well behaved, and it is necessary to use a better integral form of the universal enveloping algebra over the rational numbers. The correct notion of ``good'' integral form was found by Kostant. He found that the good integral forms are the ones with a structural base, and he showed that universal enveloping algebras of finite-dimensional semisimple Lie algebras have a structural base. The existence of a structural base implies that the dual algebra of the underlying coalgebra is a ring of formal power series. Because this ring can be thought of as a sort of ``coordinate ring'' of some sort of formal group, this condition can be thought of as saying that the formal group is smooth and connected and comes from a ``formal group law''. The main point of this paper is to find such integral forms for the universal enveloping algebras of certain infinite-dimensional Lie algebras. We recall that the universal enveloping algebra of a Lie algebra has a natural structure of a cocommutative Hopf algebra, so we need some theorems to tell us when a Hopf algebra has a structural base. In Section 2 we prove that a Hopf algebra \(H\) has a structural base, provided that there are ``sufficiently many'' grouplike elements \(1+ a_1x+ a_2x^2+\cdots\in H[[x]]\) and provided that a few other minor conditions are satisfied. Such a grouplike element should be thought of as an infinitesimal curve in the formal group, so roughly speaking this condition means that a set of generators of the Lie algebra of the formal group can be lifted to formal curves in the formal group. We also give an incidental application of these theorems to certain Hopf algebras \(F_n\) considered by Dieudonné. He showed that these Hopf algebras have a structural basis when reduced \(\operatorname {mod}p\) for any prime \(p\); we show that the Hopf algebras \(F_n\) already have a structural basis over the integers. In Section 3 we construct liftings of some elements of the vertex algebra of a lattice to formal curves. More precisely, we show that we can lift any element of a certain Lie algebra, provided that it lies in a root space of a root of norm 2 or norm 0. We do this by explicitly writing down a grouplike lifting and checking by brute force that its coefficients are integral. In Section 4 we use the liftings of Section 3 to construct a smooth integral form of the universal enveloping algebra of the fake monster Lie algebra, which is constructed from the lattice \(II_{25,1}\). The main point about this Lie algebra is that it is generated by the root spaces of norm 2 and norm 0 roots, so in Section 3 we have constructed enough liftings to apply the theorems in Section 2. We can summarize the main results about the fake monster Lie algebra proved in this paper as follows. Theorem 4.1. There is a \(II_{25,1}\)-graded Hopf algebra \(U^+({\mathfrak m})\) over \(\mathbb{Z}\) with the following properties: (1) \(U^+({\mathfrak m})\) has a structural basis over \(\mathbb{Z}\); (2) the primitive elements of \(U^+({\mathfrak m})\) are an integral form of the fake monster Lie algebra \({\mathfrak m}\); (3) for every norm 2 vector of \(II_{25,1}\), \(U^+({\mathfrak m})\) contains the usual (Kostant) integral form of the universal enveloping algebra of the corresponding \(sl_2(\mathbb{Z})\). In Section 5 we construct a smooth integral form for the universal enveloping algebra of the Virasoro algebra by applying the theorems in Section 2 to a set of explicit liftings of the basis elements of the Virasoro algebra. In other words, we construct a formal group law for the Virasoro algebra over the integers. The no-ghost theorem in string theory states that a certain real vector space of states is positive definite (so it contains no negative norm vectors, which are sometimes called ghosts and which would prevent the space from being a Hilbert space). This real vector space has a natural integral form that can be made into a positive definite lattice using the inner product, and we can ask for an integral form of the no-ghost theorem, which should say something about the structure of this lattice. In Section 6 we use the smooth formal group of the Virasoro algebra to prove an integral form of the no-ghost theorem, at least in the case of vertex algebras constructed from 26-dimensional lattices. More precisely, we prove bounds on the determinant of this lattice, which quite often imply that the lattice is self-dual. The proof [\textit{R. E. Borcherds}, Modular moonshine. III, Duke Math. J. 93, 129-154 (1998; Zbl 1047.17014)] of Ryba's modular moonshine conjectures for large primes used an unproved technical assumption about the monster Lie algebra. In Section 7 we use the integral no-ghost theorem to prove this assumption, thus completing the proof of the modular moonshine conjectures for odd primes. (The proof in [\textit{R. E. Borcherds} and \textit{A. J. E. Ryba}, Modular moonshine. II, Duke Math. J. 83, 435-459 (1996; Zbl 1032.17049)] for the prime 2 still relies on another unproved technical assumption).