Unit-regularity of regular nilpotent elements (Q295901)

Special right ideal decompositions are established for a ring \(R\) containing a (von Neumann) regular element \(a\) such that either the right annihilator \(\text{r.ann}_R(a)\) has the exchange property or all powers of \(a\) are regular. Namely, \(R_R = \text{r.ann}_R(a) \oplus X_n \oplus Y_n = E_n \oplus X_n \oplus aY_n\) for all \(n \in \mathbb N\), with \(Y_n \subseteq a^nR\) and \(E_n \cong R/aR\). It follows directly that if \(a\) is additionally nilpotent, then it is unit-regular. Applications give easier proofs of the following results: (1) Every strongly \(\pi\)-regular ring has stable range one [\textit{P. Ara}, Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 124, No. 11, 3293--3298 (1996; Zbl 0865.16007)]; (2) Any strongly \(\pi\)-regular element all of whose powers are regular is unit-regular [\textit{K. I. Beidar} et al., Commun. Algebra 32, No. 9, 3543--3562 (2004; Zbl 1074.16005)]. It has recently been shown that in general, regular nilpotent elements need not be unit regular [\textit{P. Ara} and \textit{K. C. O'meara}, Can. Math. Bull. 59, No. 3, 461--471 (2016; Zbl 1383.16007); \textit{P. P. Nielsen} and \textit{J. Šter}, ``Connections between unit-regularity, regularity, cleanness, and strong cleanness of elements and rings'', to appear in Trans. Amer. Math. Soc.].