On radicals and polynomial rings. (Q931855)

A ring without nontrivial left ideals is called left simple. An essential left ideal of a ring \(A\) is a left ideal which has a nonzero intersection with every nonzero ideal of \(A\). Let \(\mathcal M\) be any class of associative rings. In the first part of this paper the authors introduce and study the class \(\mathcal E_l(\mathcal M)\) of all rings each nonzero homomorphic image of which contains either a nonzero left ideal in \(\mathcal M\) or a proper essential left ideal. They prove that for any class \(\mathcal M\), the class \(\mathcal E_l(\mathcal M)\) is a radical and they characterize \(\mathcal E_l(\mathcal M)\) as an upper radical for certain classes \(\mathcal M\). They show that the collection of all the radicals \(\mathcal E_l(\mathcal M)\) forms a meet sublattice of the lattice of all radicals but it is not a sublattice of the lattice of all radicals with respect to \(\wedge\) and \(\vee\). Moreover, the authors show that the lattice of all radicals \(\mathcal E_l(\mathcal M)\) is atomic and coatomic and they describe the atoms and coatoms of the lattice. In the second part of the paper, the authors give a negative answer to a Gardner's question by showing that, for radicals \(\gamma\) under certain constraints, one can obtain a strictly decreasing chain of radicals \(\gamma=\gamma_{(1)}\supset\gamma_{(2)}\supset\cdots\supset\gamma_{(n)}\supset\cdots\), where, for each positive integer \(n\), \(\gamma_{(n)}\) denotes the radical consisting of all rings \(A\) such that the polynomial ring \(A[x_1,x_2,\dots,x_n]\) over \(A\) in \(n\) commuting indeterminates is in \(\gamma\). Several examples of nonhereditary radicals \(\gamma\) with \(\gamma_{(n)}\neq\gamma_{(n+1)}\) for any positive integer \(n\) are also given. Remark: The reader will find a few misprints which are easy to correct.