Truncation of unitary operads (Q783203)

Unitary operads over a fixed field \(\Bbbk\) are those one-dimensional in arities zero and one; let \(Op_+\) denote the category of such. A unitary operad \(P\) has a natural family of restriction operators \(P(n) \to P(s)\) for \(s \leq n\), obtained by composing with the \(0\)-ary operation in \(n-s\) places. These restrictions are used to define a sequence of ideals \(\vphantom{\Upsilon}^k\Upsilon\) of \(P\) by intersecting some of their kernels. An analogue of the Gelfand-Kirillov dimension of \(\Bbbk\)-algebras is given. Namely, the GK dimension of a (locally finite-dimensional) operad \(P\) is defined by the formula \[ \mathrm{GKdim}(P) = \limsup_{n\to \infty} \left( \log_n \left( \sum_{i=0}^n \dim_{\Bbbk} P(i)\right) \right). \] The authors also introduce and study other invariants, including the exponent, the signature, and the Hilbert series. Many of the results are concerned with `2-unitary operads', which are related to `operads with multiplication' in the sense of Gerstenhaber-Voronov [\textit{M. Gerstenhaber} and \textit{A. Voronov}, Int. Math. Res. Not. 1995, No. 3, 141--153 (1995; Zbl 0827.18004)]. More precisely, a \textbf{2-unitary} operad is an object of the comma category \(Mag\downarrow Op_+\) of operads under the magma operad, that is a unitary operad with a specified non-associative multiplication \(\mu\) (there are also associative and commutative variants of this notion). If \(P\) is 2-unitary and has finite GK dimension, then the GK dimension must be an integer. Further, this GK dimension can be characterized by the vanishing of the ideals \(\vphantom{\Upsilon}^k\Upsilon\). The authors classify the 2-unitary operads of small GK dimension. There is only a single 2-unitary operad of GK dimension 1, namely the commutative operad \(Com\). Every augmented \(\Bbbk\)-algebra \(\Lambda\) generates a 2-unitary operad which is \(\Lambda\) in arity one and which has dimension greater than one in all higher arities so long as \(\Lambda\) is different from \(\Bbbk\). This construction is part of an equivalence of categories between 2-unitary operads with GK dimension at most 2 and finite-dimensional, augmented \(\Bbbk\)-algebras. The quotient operads of the associative operad \(Ass\) with fixed GK dimension at most 4 are classified when \(\Bbbk\) has characteristic zero. There are only three such quotient operads, namely \(Ass / \vphantom{\Upsilon}^k\Upsilon\) for \(k=1,3,4\) of GK dimension \(k\). In particular, there is no quotient operad of \(Ass\) with GK dimension 2. It is shown that the situation is more complicated for \(k=5\). There are several other interesting directions in the paper as well, including characterizations of artinian, semiprime operads (in the reduced, unitary, or 2-unitary cases), the fact that every signature can be realized by an object of \(Com\downarrow Op_+\), and the relationship between the GK dimension of operads and of their algebras.