Algebra/Topology seminar

Speaker: Mura Yakerson

Title: An alternative to spherical Witt vectors

Abstarct: Witt vectors of a ring form a "bridge" between characteristic p and mixed characteristic: for example, Witt vectors of a finite field Fp is the ring of p-adic integers Zp. Spherical Witt vectors of a ring is a lift of classical Witt vectors to the world of higher algebra, much like sphere spectrum is a lift of the ring of integers.

In this talk we will discuss a straightforward construction of spherical Witt vectors of a ring, in the case when the ring is a perfect Fp-algebra. We will further investigate the category of modules over spherical Witt vectors, and explain a universal property of spherical Witt vectors as an E1-ring. This is joint work with Thomas Nikolaus.