Root systems and Weyl groupoids for Nichols algebras

Abstract

Motivated by work of Kac and Lusztig, we define a root system and a Weyl groupoid for a large class of semisimple Yetter-Drinfeld modules over an arbitrary Hopf algebra. The ob- tained combinatorial structure fits perfectly into an existing frame- work of generalized root systems associated to a family of Cartan matrices, and provides novel insight into Nichols algebras. We demonstrate the power of our construction with new results on Nichols algebras over finite non-abelian simple groups and sym- metric groups.