Math 551 Abstract Algebra
This is a standard course for beginning graduate students. It covers Group Theory, basic Ring & Module theory, and bilinear forms.
Current semester (Fall 2008)
This is a standard course for beginners. We will consider a lot of examples.
Group Theory: Basic concepts, isomorphism theorems,
normal subgroups, Sylow theorems, direct products and free products of groups.
Groups acting on sets: orbits, cosets, stabilizers.
Alternating/Symmetric groups.
Basic Ring Theory: Fields, Principal Ideal Domains (PIDs),
matrix rings, division algebras, field of fractions.
Modules over a PID: Fundamental Theorem for abelian groups,
application to linear algebra: rational and Jordan canonical form.
Bilinear Forms: Alternating and symmetric forms, determinants.
Spectral theorem for normal matrices, classification over R and C.
(Class supplement provided)
Modules: Artinian and Noetherian modules.
Krull-Schmidt Theorem for modules of finite length.
Simple modules and Schur's Lemma, semisimple modules.
(from Basic Algebra II)
Finite-dimensional algebras: Simple and semisimple
algebras, Artin-Wedderburn Theorem, group rings, Maschke's Theorem.
(Class supplement provided)
Homework Assignments (Fall 2008)
Previous Semesters
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Last updated: September 1, 2008
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