Brauer Group and Class Field Theory
The notion of Brauer group plays an important role in the modern formulation of the class field theory. If Kv is a non-archimedean local field, there is a canonical isomorphism invv: Br(Kv) → Q/Z constructed in local class field theory. An element of the Brauer group of order n can be represented by a cyclic division algebra of dimension n2.
The case of a global field K is addressed by the global class field theory. If D is a central simple algebra over K and v is a valuation then D ⊗ Kv is a central simple algebra over Kv, the local completion of K at v. This defines a homomorphism from the Brauer group of K into the Brauer group of Kv. A given central simple algebra D splits for all but finitely many v, so that the image of D under almost all such homomorphisms is 0. The Brauer group Br(K) fits into an exact sequence
where S is the set of all valuations of K and the right arrow is the direct sum of the local invariants and the Brauer group of the real numbers is identified with (1/2)Z/Z. The injectivity of the left arrow is the content of the Albert–Brauer–Hasse–Noether theorem. Exactness in the middle term is a deep fact from the global class field theory. The group Q/Z on the right may be interpreted as the "Brauer group" of the class formation of idele classes associated to K.
Read more about this topic: Brauer Group
Famous quotes containing the words group, class, field and/or theory:
“My routines come out of total unhappiness. My audiences are my group therapy.”
—Joan Rivers (b. 1935)
“What exacerbates the strain in the working class is the absence of money to pay for services they need, economic insecurity, poor daycare, and lack of dignity and boredom in each partners job. What exacerbates it in upper-middle class is the instability of paid help and the enormous demands of the career system in which both partners become willing believers. But the tug between traditional and egalitarian models of marriage runs from top to bottom of the class ladder.”
—Arlie Hochschild (20th century)
“They talk about a womans sphere,
As though it had a limit.
Theres not a place in earth or heaven.
Theres not a task to mankind given ...
Without a woman in it.”
—Kate Field (18381896)
“A theory of the middle class: that it is not to be determined by its financial situation but rather by its relation to government. That is, one could shade down from an actual ruling or governing class to a class hopelessly out of relation to government, thinking of govt as beyond its control, of itself as wholly controlled by govt. Somewhere in between and in gradations is the group that has the sense that govt exists for it, and shapes its consciousness accordingly.”
—Lionel Trilling (19051975)