Free presentation

In algebra, a free presentation of a module M over a commutative ring R is an exact sequence of R-modules:

$\bigoplus_{i \in I} R \overset{f} \to \bigoplus_{j \in J} R \overset{g}\to M \to 0.$

Note g then maps each basis element to each generator of M. In particular, if J is finite, then M is a finitely generated module. If I and J are finite sets, then the presentation is called a finite presentation; a module is called finitely presented if it admits a finite presentation.

A free presentation always exists: any module is a quotient of free module: $F \overset{g}\to M \to 0$, but then the kernel of g is again a quotient of a free module: $F' \overset{f} \to \ker g \to 0$. The combination of f and g is a free presentation of M. Now, one can obviously keep "resolving" the kernels in this fashion; the result is called a free resolution. Thus, a free presentation is the early part of the free resolution.

A presentation is useful for computaion. For example, since tensoring is right-exact, tensoring the above presentation with a module, say, N gives:

$\bigoplus_{i \in I} N \overset{f \otimes 1} \to \bigoplus_{j \in J} N \to M \otimes_R N \to 0.$

This says that $M \otimes_R N$ is the cokernel of $f \otimes 1$. If N is an R-algebra, then this is the presentation of the N-module $M \otimes_R N$; that is, the presentation extends under base extension.

For left-exact functors, there is for example

Proposition — Let F, G be left-exact contravariant functors from the category of modules over a commutative ring R to abelian groups and θ a natural transformation from F to G. If $\theta: F(R^{\oplus n}) \to G(R^{\oplus n})$ is an isomorphism for each natural number n, then $\theta: F(M) \to G(M)$ is an isomorphism for any finitely-presented module M.

Proof: Applying F to a finite presentation $R^{\oplus n} \to R^{\oplus m} \to M$ results in

$0 \to F(M) \to F(R^{\oplus m}) \to F(R^{\oplus n})$

and the same for G. Now apply the snake lemma. $\square$

See also

• coherent module
• quasi-coherent sheaf
• Fitting ideal
• finitely-related module

References

• Eisenbud, David, Commutative Algebra with a View Toward Algebraic Geometry, Graduate Texts in Mathematics, 150, Springer-Verlag, 1995, ISBN 0-387-94268-8.