On Cohen-Macaulay rings of invariants (Q5958863)

The authors study the question when the Cohen-Macaulay property of a Noetherian ring \(R\) passes down to the invariant ring \(R^G\) of a finite group \(G\). To this end they generalize a link between the Cohen-Macaulay property of invariant rings and cohomology \(H^*(G,R)\), which was first used by the reviewer [\textit{G. Kemper}, J. Algebra 215, No. 1, 330-351 (1999; Zbl 0934.13003)]. It is well-known that the Cohen-Macaulay property is in general not inherited by \(R^G\) if the characteristic~\(p\) of \(R\) (assumed to be a prime) divides \(|G|\). One of the results of this paper says that if \(R\) and \(R^G\) are both Cohen-Macaulay, then \(R^G\) is equal to the image of the relative transfer map \(R^H \to R^G\), where \(H\) is the subgroup of \(G\) generated by all bireflections and all \(p\)-elements. In many examples, this simply means that \(G = H\). This generalizes one of the main results from the reviewer's above-mentioned paper. Since the authors work in the general situation of a Noetherian ring, they can apply their methods to the case of multiplicative invariants, i.e., where \(R = K[x_1^{\pm 1}, \ldots, x_n^{\pm 1}]\) and \(G \subseteq\) GL\(({\mathbb Z})\) acts on the exponent vectors of monomials. In this situation they show that if \(G\) maps onto a non-trivial \(p\)-group and has a cyclic Sylow \(p\)-subgroup \(P\), then \(R^G\) is Cohen-Macaulay if and only if \(P\) is generated by a bireflection. In the reviewer's opinion this paper has achieved a very desirable level of generality while at the same time simplifying some earlier arguments.