A relational description of higher commutators in Mal'cev varieties (Q334978)

The notion of the \(n\)-ary commutator (defined by some term condition) was introduced by \textit{A. Bulatov} [in: Contributions to general algebra 13. Proceedings of the 60th workshop on general algebra ``60. Arbeitstagung Allgemeine Algebra'', Dresden, Germany, June 22--25, 2000 and of the summer school '99 on general algebra and ordered sets, Velké Karlovice, Czech Republic, August 30--September 4, 1999. Klagenfurt: Verlag Johannes Heyn. 41--54 (2001; Zbl 0986.08003)] as a generalization of the notion of the binary commutator; commutators can be used, e.g., for a distinction whether algebras are polynomially equivalent. The main result of the paper is as follows: Let \(\mathbf{A}\) be an algebra with Mal'cev term \(q\) and let \(\alpha_0, \dots, \alpha_{n-1}\) be congruences on \(\mathbf{A}\). Then there exists a largest clone \(\mathcal C(\alpha_0, \dots, \alpha_{n-1})\) on \(\mathbf{A}\) containing \(q\) such that it preserves congruences \(\alpha_0, \dots, \alpha_{n-1}\), and all commutators of the form \([\alpha_{i_0}, \dots, \alpha_{i_{k-1}}]\) (where \(k\leq n\) and \(0\leq i_0<\dots<i_{k-1}<n\)) agree in \(\mathbf{A}\) and \((A,\mathcal C(\alpha_0, \dots, \alpha_{n-1}))\). Further, several known results on higher commutators are proved by the equipment obtained in the proof of the theorem above.