Proofs of definability of some varieties and sets of varieties of semigroups. (Q444669)

A subset \(A\) of a lattice \(\langle L;\vee,\wedge\rangle\) is called `definable in \(L\)' if there exists a first-order formula \(\Phi(x)\) with one free variable \(x\) in the language of lattice operations \(\vee\) and \(\wedge\) which defines \(A\) in \(L\). This means that, for any element \(a\in L\), the sentence \(\Phi(a)\) is true if and only if \(a\in A\). If \(A\) consists of a single element, then we speak about definability of this element. A set of semigroup varieties \(X\) (or a single semigroup variety \(\mathcal X\)) is said to be `definable' if it is definable in the lattice \(\mathbf{SEM}\) of all semigroup varieties. In the introduction of this paper the author notes: ``A number of deep results about definable semigroup varieties and sets of semigroup varieties have been obtained by \textit{J. Ježek} and \textit{R. McKenzie} [see Semigroup Forum 46, No. 2, 199-245 (1993; Zbl 0782.20051)]. It has been conjectured there that every finitely based semigroup variety is definable up to duality. This conjecture has been proved there for locally finite finitely based semigroup varieties. However the paper by Ježek and McKenzie contains no explicit first-order formulas that define any given locally finite finitely based variety.'' In this paper the author presents explicit first-order formulas that define some well-known sets of varieties and individual varieties. Such first-order formulas the author gives for all completely regular varieties, all completely simple varieties, all periodic group varieties, all combinatorial varieties, all nil-varieties of semigroups, all semigroup varieties of finite degree, all semigroup varieties of finite degree \(k\), all permutative semigroup varieties and for some other sets of varieties and individual semigroup varieties.