Standard polynomials are characterized by their degree and exponent. (Q655389)

Let \(A\) be a PI-algebra over a field \(F\) of characteristic 0 with T-ideal \(T=\text{Id}(A)\). By the classical result of one of the authors of the paper under review, Amitai Regev, the codimension sequence \(c_n(A)\), \(n=1,2,\dots\), of \(A\) is exponentially bounded. By another important theorem due to the other author, Antonio Giambruno, jointly with Mikhail Zaicev, the exponent of \(A\) (and its T-ideal), \(\exp(A)=\exp(T)=\lim_{n\to\infty}\root n\of{c_n(A)}\), always exists and is an integer. For a polynomial identity \(f\) let \(\exp(f)\) be the exponent of the T-ideal generated by \(f\). Allan Berele and Regev showed that the exponent \(\exp(St_n)\) of the standard polynomial \(St_n\) of degree \(n\) is not smaller than the exponent of any polynomial of degree \(n\). The main result of the paper under review gives that \(\exp(St_n)\) is strictly larger than the exponent of any other polynomial of degree \(n\). Hence, dimension-wise, standard polynomials generate the smallest T-ideals, and in that sense they are the weakest identities among the polynomials of a given degree. More precisely, let \(n\geq 6\) and let \(f\) be a polynomial identity of degree \(n\). If \(n=2m\) is even and \(f\) is not multiple of \(St_n\), then \(\exp(f)<\exp(St_n)=m^2\). If \(n=2m+1\) is odd and \(f\) is a consequence of \(St_{2m}\), then \(\exp(f)=\exp(St_n)=m^2\). If \(f\) does not follow from \(St_{2m}\), then \(\exp(f)<\exp(St_n)\). The theorem does not hold for \(n=3\) (the exponent of the Grassmann algebra is equal to 2 and is greater than the exponent 1 of \(St_2\)) and \(n=5\) (there are identities satisfied by the algebra \(M_{1,1}\) with the same exponent 4 as \(St_4\)). The authors also give examples of T-ideals with the next largest exponent for small \(n\) and discuss interesting open problems.