05 - Homomorphisms and Isomorphisms
Let
for all
When the group operations for
but it is important to keep in mind that the product
Intuition
This stack exchange answer clarifies how the idea behind homomorphisms (unlike Isomorphisms) is that some elements may merge to be the same thing. They will have the same structure, but elements may get merged, so the isomorphism extension of bijectivity is important in that case since then elements cannot get merged together like that.
Homomorphism literally means "similar shape", so that gives the idea that squares can become triangles (still n-gons but more or less vertices).
Free Lemma
The identities are preserved, as we'll see in the following lemma:
Suppose
See 16 Homomorphisms, Isomorphisms#1.
Example
- Suppose
are any two groups. The map where any has is a trivial homomorphism:
- Consider the map
where is under addition and is under multiplication. See Isomorphism#Examples.
Inverses
In class we used this definition to give context to homomorphisms and inverses of those isomorphisms:
Suppose
We also call
The two definitions are the same here (both are saying an invertible isomorphism exists).
The map
is a Homomorphism (or Group Morphism) (ie: ) is a bijection.
So the Groups
Because things like linear maps are differently named from Homomorphism (or Group Morphism) and even the toplological continuous maps, we have different names for what are essentially maps with properties. As such, most people just say "morphism" with the object they are talking about (ex: "vector space morphism" or "group morphism").
Examples
- For any group
using the identity map. - The exponential map
defined is an isomorphism from to . Exp is a bijection since it has an inverse function and preserves the group operations since . - Consider Symmetric Group & Permutations:
Namely, let be nonempty sets. The symmetric groups and are isomorphic if .
Proof
☐
Sometimes we want to talk about different groups, sets, rings, fields, vector spaces, ... to be isomorphic, but it's hard to have a definition for that that all agree. Theorems where
Not Isomorphic
Being isomorphic occurs often when, given
is abelian iff is abelian- For all
(the orders stay the same regardless of the bijection) (see 16 Homomorphisms, Isomorphisms#2 for the proof)
So if you find a property that doesn't follow these, then they aren't going to be isomorphic.
What Properties Determine Isomorphism?
So what minimum set of properties are needed to determine isomorphism of groups? It turns out if the relations are maintained (or the generators) then that determines the morphism. Namely, if
For example, consider the dihedral group
and any relation in
Similarly:
and:
So we could have the new group