Non-integrality of the PI-exponent of special Lie algebras (Q744169)

The most popular way to measure the complexity of the polynomial identities of an algebra \(A\), especially over a field \(F\) of characteristic 0, is the growth of the codimension sequence \(c_n(A)\). An already classical result in this direction is due to the authors of the paper under review who showed the existence and the integrality of the PI-exponent \(\exp(A)=\lim_{n\to\infty}\root n\of{c_n(A)}\) of an associative PI-algebra \(A\). Later similar results were established for other classes of non-associative algebras with exponentially bounded codimension sequences, e.g., for finite-dimensional Lie algebras. There exist finitely-generated Lie algebras with non-integral PI-exponent. An important place in the study of Lie algebras with polynomial identities is taken by the special Lie algebras (which can be embedded into associative PI-algebras). In the paper under review the authors construct the first example of a special Lie algebra with non-integral PI-exponent. The construction is based on the recent result by the authors [J. Lond. Math. Soc., II. Ser. 85, No. 2, 534--548 (2012; Zbl 1271.17003)] that the seven-dimensional Lie superalgebra \(b(2)\) has a PI-exponent strictly between 6 and 7. Let \(G=G_0\oplus G_1\) be the Grassmann algebra of an infinitely dimensional vector space with its natural \({\mathbb Z}_2\)-grading and let \(b(2)=L=L_0\oplus L_1\) be the seven-dimensional Lie superalgebra consisting of \(4\times 4\) matrices \[ =\begin{pmatrix} X&Y\cr Z&-X^T\cr \end{pmatrix}, \] where \(X,Y,Z\in M_2(F)\), \(Y^T=Y\), \(Z^T=-Z\), \(\text{tr}(X)=0\), \(^T\) states for the transpose, and the even and old components are \(Xe_{11}-X^Te_{22}\) and \(Ye_{12}+Ze_{21}\), respectively. The main result of the paper gives that the Grassmann envelope \(G(L)=(G_0\otimes L_0)+(G_1\otimes L_1)\) of \(b(2)\) is a special Lie algebra with the property \[ 6.24025\approx 3^{5/3}\leq\underline{\exp}(G(L))\leq \overline{\exp}(G(L))\leq 3+2\sqrt{3}\approx6.4610. \]