One of my favorite graduate courses at Berkeley is Math 251, a one-semester course in ring theory offered to second-year level graduate students. I taught this course in the Fall of 1983, and more recently in the Spring of 1990, both times focusing on the theory of noncommutative rings. This book is an outgrowth of my lectures in these two courses, and is intended for use by instructors and graduate students in a similar one-semester course in basic ring theory. Ring theory is a subject of central importance in algebra. Historically, some of the major discoveries in ring theory have helped shape the course of development of modern abstract algebra. Today, ring theory is a fer tile meeting ground for group theory (group rings), representation theory (modules), functional analysis (operator algebras), Lie theory (enveloping algebras), algebraic geometry (finitely generated algebras, differential op erators, invariant theory), arithmetic (orders, Brauer groups), universal algebra (varieties of rings), and homological algebra (cohomology of rings, projective modules, Grothendieck and higher K-groups). In view of these basic connections between ring theory and other branches of mathemat ics, it is perhaps no exaggeration to say that a course in ring theory is an indispensable part of the education for any fledgling algebraist. The purpose of my lectures was to give a general introduction to the theory of rings, building on what the students have learned from a stan dard first-year graduate course in abstract algebra.

About This Book This book is meant to be used by beginning graduate students. It covers basic material needed by any student of algebra, and is essential to those specializing in ring theory, homological algebra, representation theory and K-theory, among others. It will also be of interest to students of algebraic topology, functional analysis, differential geometry and number theory. Our approach is more homological than ring-theoretic, as this leads the to many important areas of mathematics. This ap student more quickly proach is also, we believe, cleaner and easier to understand. However, the more classical, ring-theoretic approach, as well as modern extensions, are also presented via several exercises and sections in Chapter Five. We have tried not to leave any gaps on the paths to proving the main theorem- at most we ask the reader to fill in details for some of the sideline results; indeed this can be a fruitful way of solidifying one's understanding.

Providing an elementary introduction to noncommutative rings and algebras, this textbook begins with the classical theory of finite dimensional algebras. Only after this, modules, vector spaces over division rings, and tensor products are introduced and studied. This is followed by Jacobson's structure theory of rings. The final chapters treat free algebras, polynomial identities, and rings of quotients. Many of the results are not presented in their full generality. Rather, the emphasis is on clarity of exposition and simplicity of the proofs, with several being different from those in other texts on the subject. Prerequisites are kept to a minimum, and new concepts are introduced gradually and are carefully motivated. Introduction to Noncommutative Algebra is therefore accessible to a wide mathematical audience. It is, however, primarily intended for beginning graduate and advanced undergraduate students encountering noncommutative algebra for the first time.

This book is an expanded text for a graduate course in commutative algebra, focusing on the algebraic underpinnings of algebraic geometry and of number theory. Accordingly, the theory of affine algebras is featured, treated both directly and via the theory of Noetherian and Artinian modules, and the theory of graded algebras is included to provide the foundation for projective varieties. Major topics include the theory of modules over a principal ideal domain, and its applicationsto matrix theory (including the Jordan decomposition), the Galois theory of field extensions, transcendence degree, the prime spectrum of an algebra, localization, and the classical theory of Noetherian and Artinian rings. Later chapters include some algebraic theory of elliptic curves (featuring theMordell-Weil theorem) and valuation theory, including local fields. One feature of the book is an extension of the text through a series of appendices. This permits the inclusion of more advanced material, such as transcendental field extensions, the discriminant and resultant, the theory of Dedekind domains, and basic theorems of rings of algebraic integers. An extended appendix on derivations includes the Jacobian conjecture and Makar-Limanov's theory of locally nilpotent derivations. Grobnerbases can be found in another appendix. Exercises provide a further extension of the text. The book can be used both as a textbook and as a reference source.

This introduction to noncommutative noetherian rings is intended to be accessible to anyone with a basic background in abstract algebra. It can be used as a second-year graduate text, or as a self-contained reference. Extensive explanatory discussion is given, and exercises are integrated throughout. This edition incorporates substantial revisions, particularly in the first third of the book, where the presentation has been changed to increase accessibility and topicality. New material includes the basic types of quantum groups, which then serve as test cases for the theory developed.

Noncommutative Rings provides a cross-section of ideas, techniques, and results that give the reader an idea of that part of algebra which concerns itself with noncommutative rings. In the space of 200 pages, Herstein covers the Jacobson radical, semisimple rings, commutativity theorems, simple algebras, representations of finite groups, polynomial identities, Goldie's theorem, and the Golod–Shafarevitch theorem. Almost every practicing ring theorist has studied portions of this classic monograph.

This is a reprinted edition of a work that was considered the definitive account in the subject area upon its initial publication by J. Wiley & Sons in 1987. It presents, within a wider context, a comprehensive account of noncommutative Noetherian rings. The author covers the major developments from the 1950s, stemming from Goldie's theorem and onward, including applications to group rings, enveloping algebras of Lie algebras, PI rings, differential operators, and localization theory. The book is not restricted to Noetherian rings, but discusses wider classes of rings where the methods apply more generally. In the current edition, some errors were corrected, a number of arguments have been expanded, and the references were brought up to date. This reprinted edition will continue to be a valuable and stimulating work for readers interested in ring theory and its applications to other areas of mathematics.

The already broad range of applications of ring theory has been enhanced in the eighties by the increasing interest in algebraic structures of considerable complexity, the so-called class of quantum groups. One of the fundamental properties of quantum groups is that they are modelled by associative coordinate rings possessing a canonical basis, which allows for the use of algorithmic structures based on Groebner bases to study them. This book develops these methods in a self-contained way, concentrating on an in-depth study of the notion of a vast class of non-commutative rings (encompassing most quantum groups), the so-called Poincaré-Birkhoff-Witt rings. We include algorithms which treat essential aspects like ideals and (bi)modules, the calculation of homological dimension and of the Gelfand-Kirillov dimension, the Hilbert-Samuel polynomial, primality tests for prime ideals, etc.

This book provides a complete abstract algebra course, enabling instructors to select the topics for use in individual classes.