Projective module

In mathematics, particularly in algebra, the class of projective modules enlarges the class of free modules over a ring, keeping some of the main properties of free modules. Various equivalent characterizations of these modules appear below.
Every free module is a projective module, but the converse fails to hold over some rings, such as Dedekind rings that are not principal ideal domains. However, every projective module is a free module if the ring is a principal ideal domain such as the integers, or a polynomial ring over a field.
Projective modules were first introduced in 1956 in the influential book Homological Algebra by Henri Cartan and Samuel Eilenberg.

Definitions

Lifting property

The usual category theoretical definition is in terms of the property of lifting that carries over from free to projective modules: a module P is projective if and only if for every surjective module homomorphism and every module homomorphism, there exists a module homomorphism such that.
The advantage of this definition of "projective" is that it can be carried out in categories more general than module categories: we don't need a notion of "free object". It can also be dualized, leading to injective modules. The lifting property may also be rephrased as every morphism from to factors through every epimorphism to . Thus, by definition, projective modules are precisely the projective objects in the category of R-modules.

Split-exact sequences

A module P is projective if and only if every short exact sequence of modules of the form
is a split exact sequence. That is, for every surjective module homomorphism there exists a section map, that is, a module homomorphism such that fh = id_P. In that case, is a direct summand of B, h is an isomorphism from P to, and is a projection on the summand. Equivalently,

Direct summands of free modules

A module P is projective if and only if there is another module Q such that the direct sum of P and Q is a free module.

Exactness

An R-module P is projective if and only if the covariant functor is an exact functor, where is the category of left R-modules and Ab is the category of abelian groups. When the ring R is commutative, Ab is advantageously replaced by in the preceding characterization. This functor is always left exact, but, when P is projective, it is also right exact. This means that P is projective if and only if this functor preserves epimorphisms, or if it preserves finite colimits.

Dual basis

A module P is projective if and only if there exists a set and a set such that for every x in P, f_i is only nonzero for finitely many i, and.

Elementary examples and properties

The following properties of projective modules are quickly deduced from any of the above definitions of projective modules:

Direct sums and direct summands of projective modules are projective.
If is an idempotent in the ring, then is a projective left module over R.

Let be the direct product of two rings and which is a ring with operations defined componentwise. Let and Then and are idempotents, and belong to the centre of The two-sided ideals and are projective modules, since their direct sum equals the free -module. However, if and are nontrivial, then they are not free as modules over. For instance is projective but not free over.

Relation to other module-theoretic properties

The relation of projective modules to free and flat modules is subsumed in the following diagram of module properties:
Module properties in commutative algebra
The left-to-right implications are true over any ring, although some authors define torsion-free modules only over a domain. The right-to-left implications are true over the rings labeling them. There may be other rings over which they are true. For example, the implication labeled "local ring or PID" is also true for polynomial rings over a field: this is the Quillen–Suslin theorem.

Projective vs. free modules

Any free module is projective. The converse is true in the following cases:

if R is a field or skew field: any module is free in this case.
if the ring R is a principal ideal domain. For example, this applies to , so an abelian group is projective if and only if it is a free abelian group. The reason is that any submodule of a free module over a principal ideal domain is free.
if the ring R is a local ring. This fact is the basis of the intuition of "locally free = projective". This fact is easy to prove for finitely generated projective modules. In general, it is due to ; see Kaplansky's theorem on projective modules.

In general though, projective modules need not be free:

Over a direct product of rings where R and S are nonzero rings, both and are non-free projective modules.
Over a Dedekind domain a non-principal ideal is always a projective module that is not a free module.
Over a matrix ring M_n, the natural module Rⁿ is projective but is not free when n > 1.
Over a semisimple ring, every module is projective, but a nonzero proper left ideal is not a free module. Thus the only semisimple rings for which all projectives are free are division rings.

The difference between free and projective modules is, in a sense, measured by the algebraic K-theory group K₀; see below.

Projective vs. flat modules

Every projective module is flat. The converse is in general not true: the abelian group Q is a Z-module that is flat, but not projective.
Conversely, a finitely related flat module is projective.
and proved that a module M is flat if and only if it is a direct limit of finitely-generated free modules.
In general, the precise relation between flatness and projectivity was established by who showed that a module M is projective if and only if it satisfies the following conditions:

M is flat,
M is a direct sum of countably generated modules,
M satisfies a certain Mittag-Leffler-type condition.

This characterization can be used to show that if is a faithfully flat map of commutative rings and is an -module, then is projective if and only if is projective. In other words, the property of being projective satisfies faithfully flat descent.

The category of projective modules

Submodules of projective modules need not be projective; a ring R for which every submodule of a projective left module is projective is called left hereditary.
Quotients of projective modules also need not be projective, for example Z/n is a quotient of Z, but not torsion-free, hence not flat, and therefore not projective.
The category of finitely generated projective modules over a ring is an exact category..

Projective resolutions

Given a module, M, a projective resolution of M is an infinite exact sequence of modules
with all the P_i s projective. Every module possesses a projective resolution. In fact a free resolution exists. The exact sequence of projective modules may sometimes be abbreviated to or. A classic example of a projective resolution is given by the Koszul complex of a regular sequence, which is a free resolution of the ideal generated by the sequence.
The length of a finite resolution is the index n such that P_n is nonzero and for i greater than n. If M admits a finite projective resolution, the minimal length among all finite projective resolutions of M is called its projective dimension and denoted pd. If M does not admit a finite projective resolution, then by convention the projective dimension is said to be infinite. As an example, consider a module M such that. In this situation, the exactness of the sequence 0 → P₀ → M → 0 indicates that the arrow in the center is an isomorphism, and hence M itself is projective.

Projective modules over commutative rings

Projective modules over commutative rings have nice properties.
The localization of a projective module is a projective module over the localized ring.
A projective module over a local ring is free. Thus a projective module is locally free. The converse is true for finitely generated modules over Noetherian rings: a finitely generated module over a commutative Noetherian ring is locally free if and only if it is projective.
However, there are examples of finitely generated modules over a non-Noetherian ring that are locally free and not projective. For instance,
a Boolean ring has all of its localizations isomorphic to F₂, the field of two elements, so any module over a Boolean ring is locally free, but
there are some non-projective modules over Boolean rings. One example is R/''I where
R'' is a direct product of countably many copies of F₂ and I is the direct sum of countably many copies of F₂ inside of R.
The R-module R/''I is locally free since R'' is Boolean, but R/''I is not projective because
I'' is not a principal ideal.
However, it is true that for finitely presented modules M over a commutative ring R, the following are equivalent.

is flat.
is projective.
is free as -module for every maximal ideal of R.
is free as -module for every prime ideal of R.
There exist generating the unit ideal such that is free as -module for each i.
is a locally free sheaf on the affine scheme

Moreover, if R is a Noetherian integral domain, then, by Nakayama's lemma, these conditions are equivalent to

The dimension of the -vector space is the same for all prime ideals of R, where is the residue field at. That is to say, M has constant rank.

Let A be a commutative ring. If B is a A-algebra that is a finitely generated projective A-module containing A as a subring, then A is a direct factor of B.