A measure of non-sequential Cohen-Macaulayness of finitely generated modules (Q324231)

Let \((R,\mathfrak{m})\) be a Noetherian local ring and \(M\) a \(d\)-dimensional finitely generated \(R\)-module. Since \(M\) is Noetherian, one may construct a strict chain \[ \text{H}_{\mathfrak{m}}^0(M)=D_t\subset D_{t-1}\subset \cdots \subset D_1\subset D_{0}=M \] of submodules of \(M\) such that \(D_i\) is the largest submodule of \(M\) of dimension less than \(\dim_RD_{i-1}\) for all \(i=1,\dots ,t\). If the \(R\)-module \(D_{i-1}/D_i\) is Cohen-Macaulay (respectively, generalized Cohen-Macaulay) for all \(i=1,\dots ,t\), then \(M\) is called sequentially Cohen-Macaulay (respectively, sequentially generalized Cohen-Macaulay). \textit{Nguyen Tu Cuong} [Nagoya Math. J. 125, 105--114 (1992; Zbl 0783.13020)] defined the notion of polynomial type for finitely generated \(R\)-modules. By Lemma 2.3 of this paper, the polynomial type of \(M\) can be expressed as \[ p(M):=\max\{\dim_{\widehat{R}}(\widehat{R}/\text{Ann}_{\widehat{R}}(\text{H}_{\mathfrak{m}}^i(M))) | \;0\leq i<d\}. \] The main aim of this paper is to introduce a counterpart of the notion of polynomial type for sequentially Cohen-Macaulayness. The authors define \textit{sequential polynomial type} of \(M\) as \[ \mathrm{sp}(M):=\max\{p(D_{i-1}/D_i) | \;i=1,\dots ,t\}. \] They establish the analogues of several properties of the notion of polynomial type for their newly defined notion. By convention, the zero module has dimension -1. So \(M\) is sequentially Cohen-Macaulay (respectively, sequentially generalized Cohen- Macaulay) if and only if \(\mathrm{sp}(M)=-1\) (respectively, \(\mathrm{sp}(M)\leq 0\)). They prove that if \(R\) is catenary and \(\mathfrak{p}\in \text{Supp}_RM\) is such that \(\dim(R/\mathfrak{p})>\mathrm{sp}(M)\), then \(M_{\mathfrak{p}}\) is a sequentially Cohen-Macaulay \(R_{\mathfrak{p}}\)-module. Also, they show that \(\mathrm{sp}(\widehat{M})\leq \mathrm{sp}(M)\) with the equality if \(R/\mathfrak{p}\) is unmixed for all associated primes \(\mathfrak{p}\) of \(M\).