Cross-connections of completely simple semigroups

Abstract

A completely simple semigroup [Formula: see text] is a semigroup without zero which has no proper ideals and contains a primitive idempotent. It is known that [Formula: see text] is a regular semigroup and any completely simple semigroup is isomorphic to the Rees matrix semigroup [Formula: see text] (cf. D. Rees, On semigroups, Proc. Cambridge Philos. Soc. 36 (1940) 387–400). In the study of structure theory of regular semigroups, Nambooripad introduced the concept of normal categories to construct the semigroup from its principal left (right) ideals using cross-connections. A normal category [Formula: see text] is a small category with subobjects wherein each object of the category has an associated idempotent normal cone and each morphism admits a normal factorization. A cross-connection between two normal categories [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] is a local isomorphism [Formula: see text] where [Formula: see text] is the normal dual of the category [Formula: see text]. In this paper, we identify the normal categories associated with a completely simple semigroup [Formula: see text] and show that the semigroup of normal cones [Formula: see text] is isomorphic to a semi-direct product [Formula: see text]. We characterize the cross-connections in this case and show that each sandwich matrix [Formula: see text] correspond to a cross-connection. Further we use each of these cross-connections to give a representation of the completely simple semigroup as a cross-connection semigroup.