Gorenstein model structures and generalized derived categories

Abstract

In a paper from 2002, Hovey introduced the Gorenstein projective and Gorenstein injective model structures on R-Mod, the category of R-modules, where R is any Gorenstein ring. These two model structures are Quillen equivalent and in fact there is a third equivalent structure we introduce: the Gorenstein flat model structure. The homotopy category with respect to each of these is called the stable module category of R. If such a ring R has finite global dimension, the graded ring R[x]/(x2) is Gorenstein and the three associated Gorenstein model structures on R[x]/(x2)-Mod, the category of graded R[x]/(x2)-modules, are nothing more than the usual projective, injective and flat model structures on Ch(R), the category of chain complexes of R-modules. Although these correspondences only recover these model structures on Ch(R) when R has finite global dimension, we can set R = ℤ and use general techniques from model category theory to lift the projective model structure from Ch(ℤ) to Ch(R) for an arbitrary ring R. This shows that homological algebra is a special case of Gorenstein homological algebra. Moreover, this method of constructing and lifting model structures carries through when ℤ[x]/(x2) is replaced by many other graded Gorenstein rings (or Hopf algebras, which lead to monoidal model structures). This gives us a natural way to generalize both chain complexes over a ring R and the derived category of R and we give some examples of such generalizations. Copyright © Edinburgh Mathematical Society 2010.