ON THE LATTICES OF NATURAL AND CONATURAL CLASSES IN<i>R</i>-MOD (Q2749040)

In studying rings and modules, some kinds of lattices of module classes have been used to obtain informations about the internal structure of the ring and about the module categories associated. An important lattice of such module classes is the lattice of natural classes introduced by \textit{J. Dauns} [Lect. Notes Pure Appl. Math. 140, 39-65 (1993; Zbl 0808.16003)]. Let \(R\) be a ring with identity. A class in \(R\)-mod is called natural if it is closed under submodules, direct sums and injective hulls. The lattice of all natural classes is denoted by \(R\)-nat. On the other hand, a class in \(R\)-mod is called hereditary if it is closed under isomorphisms and submodules. The class of all hereditary classes is denoted by \(R\)-her. Then the authors prove that the skeleton of \(R\)-her is precisely \(R\)-nat. The authors also consider the class \(R\)-quot of all module classes closed under taking quotients and say conatural classes to the elements of the skeleton of \(R\)-quot. They give some characterizations of conatural classes and also some examples of atoms in the lattices studied here. Finally, characterizations of left max rings and left perfect rings are given.