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Characterizations of categories of commutative C*-subalgebras

Operator Algebras 2016-12-02 v3 Category Theory Quantum Physics

Abstract

We aim to characterize the category of injective *-homomorphisms between commutative C*-subalgebras of a given C*-algebra A. We reduce this problem to finding a weakly terminal commutative subalgebra of A, and solve the latter for various C*-algebras, including all commutative ones and all type I von Neumann algebras. This addresses a natural generalization of the Mackey-Piron programme: which lattices are those of closed subspaces of Hilbert space? We also discuss the way this categorified generalization differs from the original question.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1106.5942,
  title  = {Characterizations of categories of commutative C*-subalgebras},
  author = {Chris Heunen},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1106.5942},
  year   = {2016}
}

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24 pages