Beyond regular semigroups (Q283337)

As the author writes in the abstract ``The aim of this paper is to study weakly \(U\)-regular semigroups, a wide class containing all regular semigroups and all abundant semigroups with a regular biordered set of idempotents. Here, \(U\) is a regular biordered set.'' (A notion of ``a regular biordered set'' was introduced in [\textit{K. S. S. Nambooripad}, Mem. Am. Math. Soc. 224, 117 p. (1979; Zbl 0457.20051)]). Let \(S\) be a semigroup with the set of idempotents \(E(S)\) and let \(U\) be a non-empty subset of \(E(S)\). The author presents a pre-order on \(S\) as follows: for all \(a,b\in S\) define \(a\leq_{\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U} b\) if and only if \(\forall e\in U\, (be=b\Rightarrow ae=a)\). Notice that the relation \(\leq_{\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U}\) induces an equivalence \(\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U\) by the rule that for all \(a,b\in S\), there is \(a\widetilde{\mathcal L}_Ub\) if and only if \(a\leq_{\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U}b\) and \(b\leq_{\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U}a\). In fact, \({\mathcal L}\subseteq {\mathcal L^*}\subseteq\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U\) and \({\mathcal L}= {\mathcal L^*}= \widetilde{\mathcal L}_U\) if \(S\) is regular and \(U=E(S)\). The relations \(\leq_{\widetilde{\mathcal R}_U}\) and \(\widetilde{\mathcal R}_U\) can be defined as the left-right duals of \(\leq_{\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U}\) and \(\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U\), respectively. As the author notes, it is well known that \({\mathcal L}\) and \({\mathcal L^*}\) are always right compatible, but it is not true for \(\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U\). A semigroup satisfies the congruence condition (C) if the relation \(\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U\) is a right congruence and \(\widetilde{\mathcal R}_U\) is a left congruence. A semigroup \(S\) is said to be \textit{weakly \(U\)-abundant} if each \(\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U\)-class and each \(\widetilde{\mathcal R}_U\)-class contains an idempotent of \(U\). If \(S\) is such a semigroup and \(a\in S\), then the author follows the usual practice and denotes idempotents in the \(\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U\)-class and \(\widetilde{\mathcal R}_U\)-class of \(a\) by \(a^*\) and \(a^+\), respectively. In general, each \(\widetilde{\mathcal L}_U\)-class and each \(\widetilde{\mathcal R}_U\)-class contains more than one idempotent of \(U\) unless \(U\) is a semilattice. The non-empty subset \(U\) of \(E(S)\) in a weakly \(U\)-abundant semigroup is called a \textit{distinguished set of idempotents}. Let \(S\) and \(T\) be semigroups with distinguished subsets of idempotents \(U\) and \(V\), respectively, and let \(\phi : S\rightarrow T\) be a morphism such that \(U\phi \subseteq V\). Then, \(\phi\) is said to be \textit{admissible} if for any \(a,b\in S\) the following implications \(a\widetilde{\mathcal L}_Ub\Rightarrow a\phi{\widetilde{\mathcal L}_V}b\phi\) and \(a\widetilde{\mathcal R}_Ub\Rightarrow a\phi{\widetilde{\mathcal R}_V}b\phi\) holds. A weakly \(U\)-abundant semigroup with (C) is said to be a \textit{weakly \(U\)-regular semigroup} if \(\langle U\rangle\) is a regular semigroup whose set of idempotents is \(U\). The next step of this paper is the introduction of the notion of weakly regular categories over regular biordered sets and RBS functors. The main theorem asserts that the category \({\mathcal {WRS}}\) of weakly \(U\)-regular semigroups and admissible morphisms is equivalent to the category \({\mathcal {WRC}}\) of weakly regular categories over regular biordered sets and RBS functors. In the last section, the author shows that the theorem by \textit{S. Armstrong} [J. Algebra 118, No. 1, 205--260 (1988; Zbl 0653.20064)] and the theorem by \textit{K. S. S. Nambooripad} [Mem. Am. Math. Soc. 224, 117 p. (1979; Zbl 0457.20051)] are consequences of his results.