Quantum groupoids and dynamical categories. (Q2490845)

In relation to the study of the dynamical Yang-Baxter equation, \textit{P. Etingof} and \textit{A. Varchenko} [Commun. Math. Phys. 205, No. 1, 19--52 (1999; Zbl 0943.17010)] introduced and studied certain categories, which have subsequently been generalized by the authors [Commun. Math. Phys. 254, No. 3, 719--760 (2005; Zbl 1069.17006)]. They have called such categories dynamical categories and in the present paper these are studied further. The principal result here is the realization of dynamical categories as categories of modules over bialgebroids. Bialgebroids generalize bialgebras: reconstruction theory of monoidal categories tells us that some monoidal categories may be realized as module categories of bialgebras, via a functor to the category of vector spaces. However not all monoidal categories have associated bialgebras; bialgebroids arise when the functor's target category is a category of bimodules over an associative algebra. We refer the reader to [\textit{J.-H. Lu}, Int. J. Math. 7, No. 1, 47--70 (1996; Zbl 0884.17010)]; the present paper also recalls some theory of bialgebroids in Section 3. The authors extend ideas from quantum group theory to define quasitriangular structures and universal \(R\)-matrices for bialgebroids. A quasitriangular bialgebroid is called a quantum groupoid and this paper studies the quantum groupoids associated to dynamical categories. This links the dynamical Yang-Baxter equation with bialgebroids and in particular with their Lie versions, Lie bialgebroids. Significantly, it is shown here, that classical dynamical \(r\)-matrices are in bijection with a special class of coboundary Lie bialgebroids.