Inverse Semigroup - Connections With Category Theory

Connections With Category Theory

The above composition of partial transformations of a set gives rise to a symmetric inverse semigroup. There is another way of composing partial transformations, which is more restrictive than that used above: two partial transformations α and β are composed if, and only if, the image of α is equal to the domain of β; otherwise, the composition αβ is undefined. Under this alternative composition, the collection of all partial one-one transformations of a set forms not an inverse semigroup but an inductive groupoid, in the sense of category theory. This close connection between inverse semigroups and inductive groupoids is embodied in the Ehresmann-Schein-Nambooripad Theorem, which states that an inductive groupoid can always be constructed from an inverse semigroup, and conversely. More precisely, an inverse semigroup is precisely a groupoid in the category of posets which is an etale groupoid with respect to its (dual) Alexandrov topology and whose poset of objects is a meet-semilattice.