Structured versus decorated cospans

MaRDI QIDQ5045911zbMATH OpenFDO

Authors John Baez, Kenny Courser, Christina Vasilakopoulou

Publication date 7 November 2022

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/2101.09363

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Categories of spans/cospans, relations, or partial maps (18B10) Monoidal categories, symmetric monoidal categories (18M05)

Abstract: One goal of applied category theory is to understand open systems. We compare two ways of describing open systems as cospans equipped with extra data. First, given a functor $LcolonmathsfAomathsfX$, a "structured cospan" is a diagram in $mathsfX$ of the form $L(a)ightarrowxleftarrowL(b)$. If $mathsfA$ and $mathsfX$ have finite colimits and $L$ preserves them, it is known that there is a symmetric monoidal double category whose objects are those of $mathsfA$ and whose horizontal 1-cells are structured cospans. Second, given a pseudofunctor $FcolonmathsfAomathbfCat$, a "decorated cospan" is a diagram in $mathsfA$ of the form $aightarrowmleftarrowb$ together with an object of $F(m)$. Generalizing the work of Fong, we show that if $mathsfA$ has finite colimits and $Fcolon(mathsfA,+)o(mathsfCat,imes)$ is symmetric lax monoidal, there is a symmetric monoidal double category whose objects are those of $mathsfA$ and whose horizontal 1-cells are decorated cospans. We prove that under certain conditions, these two constructions become isomorphic when we take $mathsfX=intF$ to be the Grothendieck category of $F$. We illustrate these ideas with applications to electrical circuits, Petri nets, dynamical systems and epidemiological modeling.

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Cited in

(10)

• Categorifying the ZX-calculus
• Decorated cospans
• Decorated Corelations
• Double categories of open dynamical systems (extended abstract)
• Structured cospans
• A bicategory of decorated cospans
• Compositional Modeling with Stock and Flow Diagrams
• A categorical framework for modeling with stock and flow diagrams
• The equifibered approach to -properads
• Structured and decorated cospans from the viewpoint of double category theory

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