Related papers: On Trace Zero Matrices and Commutators

Let $A$ be a $m\times m$ complex matrix with zero trace and let $\e>0$. Then there are $m\times m$ matrices $B$ and $C$ such that $A=[B,C]$ and $\|B\|\|C\|\le K_\e m^\e\|A\|$ where $K_\e$ depends only on $\e$. Moreover, the matrix $B$ can…

A ring is called a commutator ring if every element is a sum of additive commutators. In this paper we give examples of such rings. In particular, we show that given any ring R, a right R-module N, and a set X, End_R(\bigoplus_X N) and…

We prove that for every trace zero matrix $A$ over a principal ideal ring $R$, there exist trace zero matrices $X,Y$ over $R$ such that $XY-YX=A$. Moreover, we show that $X$ can be taken to be regular mod every maximal ideal of $R$. This…

Let T be an n by n zero-square matrix over a commutative unital ring R. We show that T is similar to a multiple of E_1n if R is a GCD domain and n = 2, if R is a GCD domain with 2 not zero divisor and n = 3, but there are matrices which are…

Let $A$ be a $m\times m$ complex matrix with zero trace. Then there are $m\times m$ matrices $B$ and $C$ such that $A=[B,C]$ and $\|B\|\|C\|_2\le (\log m+O(1))^{1/2}\|A\|_2$ where $\|D\|$ is the norm of $D$ as an operator on $\ell_2^m$ and…

We prove that if R is a principal ideal ring and A\in\M_n(R) is a matrix with trace zero, then A is a commutator, that is, A=XY-YX for some X,Y\in\M_n(R). This generalises the corresponding result over fields due to Albert and Muckenhoupt,…

We study the problem when every matrix over a division ring is representable as either the product of traceless matrices or the product of semi-traceless matrices, and also give some applications of such decompositions. Specifically, we…

Let R be an associative ring.In the paper we study n-generalized commutators of rings and prove that if R is a noncommutative prime ring and n > 2, then every nonzero n-generalized Lie ideal of R contains a nonzero ideal. Therefore, if R is…

We investigate the question of whether all elements of trace zero in a II_1-factor are single commutators. We show that all nilpotent elements are single commutators, as are all normal elements of trace zero whose spectral distributions are…

It is known that every complex trace-zero matrix is the sum of four square-zero matrices, but not necessarily of three such matrices. In this note, we prove that for every trace-zero matrix $A$ over an arbitrary field, there is a…

We show that a ring $\,R\,$ has two idempotents $\,e,e'\,$ with an invertible commutator $\,ee'-e'e\,$ if and only if $\,R \cong {\mathbb M}_2(S)\,$ for a ring $\,S\,$ in which $\,1\,$ is a sum of two units. In this case, the…

Let $R$ be a ring and let $n\ge 2$. We discuss the question of whether every element in the matrix ring $M_n(R)$ is a product of (additive) commutators $[x,y]=xy-yx$, for $x,y\in M_n(R)$. An example showing that this does not always hold,…

According to an old result of Albert and Muckenhoupt, the commutators in the endomorphism ring of a finite dimensional vector space are precisely the elements of trace zero. We replace the finite dimensional vector space with a complex of…

In this expository paper, various properties of matrix traces, determinants and adjugate matrices are proved, including the *trace Cayley-Hamilton theorem*, which says that \[ kc_k + \sum_{i=1}^k \operatorname{Tr} (A^i) c_{k-i} = 0 \qquad…

Let $R$ be a commutative ring with $1\not = 0$, $Z(R)$ be the set of all zero-divisors of $R$, and $n \geq 1$. This paper introduces the $n$-total graph of a commutative ring $R$. The $n$-total graph of a commutative ring $R$, denoted by…

A unimodular $2\times 2$ matrix with entries in a commutative $R$ is called extendable (resp.\ simply extendable) if it extends to an invertible $3\times 3$ matrix (resp.\ invertible $3\times 3$ matrix whose $(3,3)$ entry is $0$). We obtain…

We study so called regular Lie algebras, i.e. Lie algebras in which each nonzero element is regular. We make a connection with an open problem whether any element of reduced trace zero in a simple associative algebra is a commutator.

Let R be a local Noetherian commutative ring. We prove that R is an Artinian Gorenstein ring if and only if every ideal in R is a trace ideal. We discuss when the trace ideal of a module coincides with its double annihilator.

A commutator of unipotent matrices of index 2 is a matrix of the form $XYX^{-1}Y^{-1}$, where $X$ and $Y$ are unipotent matrices of index 2, that is, $X\ne I_n$, $Y\ne I_n$, and $(X-I_n)^2=(Y-I_n)^2=0_n$. If $n>2$ and $\mathbb F$ is a field…

To each real continuous function f there is an associated trace function on real symmetric matrices Tr f. The classical Klein lemma states that f is convex if and only if Tr f is convex. In this note we present an algebraic strengthening of…