MATH 505.

W01: ABSTRACT ALGEBRA I

CRN 71018

Note to Reader: The notes you are about to complete has a new section. This section is
called a side bar and is denoted “
SB: ”. A side bar is an opportunity for me to remind
you all of something that either should have been introduced to you all in a different class
or is mentioned in a previous section of this textbook.

Chapter 2: The Structure of Groups

In Section 1.2, we were intorduced to isomorphisms. If G and H are two groups were
G  H then G and H are very similar to each other. Since G  H then there exists a
homomorphism f : G Ñ H. Since f is a bijection then |G|  |H |. We already know that f
is observation preserving. By Theorem 3.5, if G is cyclic then H must also be cyclic. Finally,
assume that G is commutative. Let a, b P G. Then

ab  ba ùñ f pabq  f pbaq
ùñ f paqf pbq  f pbqf paq.
Therefore, H is also commutative. Basically, if G  H then G and H have the same
structure. In this chapter, we will discuss the structure of groups that satisfy the same
characteristics.

Section 2.1: Free Abelian Groups

We start our discussion with abelian groups.

NOTE: As mentioned in Section 1.1, if a group G is abelian then the operation will be
written using additive notation. So we will now translate the multiplicative notation used
in chapter one into additive notation:

• ab ????? • aH ?????
• a
1 ????? • GH ?????
• e ?????
• H _K ?????
• an ?????
± ω
• ab
1 ????? • P Gi
i I ?????

• HK ????? • weak product sum ?????.

Thanks to Theorem 1.2.8, we know that if G is an abelian group then any subgroup
generated by an nonempty subset of X has a nice property.

Definition 1. Provide a formal definition for linear combination and basis.

1
 Note that this is not exactly the same as the bases of a vector space.

Theorem 1. Theorem1.1: ?????

QU: What is an interal direct sum? What is a defining characteristic for an internal
direct sum? (See Theorem 8.9.)

Proof. (Theorem 1.1 ): A sketch of the proof is given. Complete the proof of piiiqimpliespiq
° °
by verifying that tθx |x P X u is a basis of Z and use the isomporphism F  Z to build
a basis of F .

NOTE: In the proof of Theorem 1.1, we are introduced to a process that allows us to
build a free abelian group from a basis X.
¸
• STP 1: Let F  Z.
P
x X

• STP 2: For each x P X, let θx  pu1 , u2 , . . . ux q P F such that ui  0 for i  x and

ux  1. Since tθx |x P X u is a basis of F then F is free over tθx |x P X u.

• STP 3: Define f : X Ñ F be defined by x ÞÑ θx.Then f is injective which implies F

is free on X by Theorem 1.1(iv).

We can use the results of Theorem 1.1 to define a new type of abelian group.

Definition 2. Provide a formal definition of free abelian group.

Example 1. Show that Z ` Z is a free abelian group by verifying that B  tp0, 1q, p1, 0qu is
a basis for Z ` Z.
We can use the existence of a basis to get more information about the structure of the
free abelian group.

Theorem 2. Theorem 1.2: ?????

Proof. A sketch of the proof is given.

QU: Why can they assume that F  Z `    ` Z (n summands)?
• Verify that 2G  t2u|u P Gu is a subgroup of G.

• Verify that 2F  2Z `    ` 2Z (n summands).

Since the cardinality of any two bases must be the same then we can apply a basis’
cardinality to the free abelian group.

2
Definition 3. Provide a formal definition for rank.
Recall from Section 1.3, if two groups are isomorphic to each other then are essentially
the same group. Our next result allows us to use rank to detemine if two free abelian groups
are isomorphic to each other.

Proposition 1. Proposition 1.3: ?????

Proof. A sketch of the proof is given. Use it to write the formal proof of the previous
proposition.
This next results builds a bridge between abelian groups and free abelian groups.
Theorem 3. Theorem1.4: ?????
Proof.
QU: Why do we know that an abelian group G has a set of generators X?
We now prove a theorem that will be extremely useful in analyzing the structure of
finitely generated abelian groups. We shall need:

Lemma 1. Lemma 1.5: ?????

Proof. Show that xj 
ax1 pxj axiq implies that
F  xx1 , . . . , xj
1 , xj axi , xj 1 , . . . , xn y.

SB: Before we state the next theorem, we need to remind ourselves of some notation. Let
a and b be integers. Then a divides b, denoted a|b if there exists some integer c such that
b  ac.
Theorem 4. Theorem1.6: ?????
Proof. The proof is being done inductively on n. Identify the induction hypothesis P pnq.
Explain the induction step. Be sure to point out when/how the induction hypothesis is being
used.

NOTE: Every subgroup of a free abelian group with rank α (α may be infinite) is a free
abelian group with rank β where β ¤ α.

In the next section we will discuss finitely generated abelian groups. Our last result of
this section helps our transition from free abelian groups to finitely generated abelian groups.

Corollary 1. Corollary 1.8: ?????

Proof. The proof is given. Solidify your understanding by showing why the corollary will
fail when the word “abelian” is omitted.(Hint: See Exercise 8.)