The Stacks project

10.31 Noetherian rings

A ring $R$ is Noetherian if any ideal of $R$ is finitely generated. This is clearly equivalent to the ascending chain condition for ideals of $R$. By Lemma 10.28.10 it suffices to check that every prime ideal of $R$ is finitely generated.

slogan

Lemma 10.31.1. Any finitely generated ring over a Noetherian ring is Noetherian. Any localization of a Noetherian ring is Noetherian.

Proof. The statement on localizations follows from the fact that any ideal $J \subset S^{-1}R$ is of the form $I \cdot S^{-1}R$. Any quotient $R/I$ of a Noetherian ring $R$ is Noetherian because any ideal $\overline{J} \subset R/I$ is of the form $J/I$ for some ideal $I \subset J \subset R$. Thus it suffices to show that if $R$ is Noetherian so is $R[X]$. Suppose $J_1 \subset J_2 \subset \ldots $ is an ascending chain of ideals in $R[X]$. Consider the ideals $I_{i, d}$ defined as the ideal of elements of $R$ which occur as leading coefficients of degree $d$ polynomials in $J_ i$. Clearly $I_{i, d} \subset I_{i', d'}$ whenever $i \leq i'$ and $d \leq d'$. By the ascending chain condition in $R$ there are at most finitely many distinct ideals among all of the $I_{i, d}$. (Hint: Any infinite set of elements of $\mathbf{N} \times \mathbf{N}$ contains an increasing infinite sequence.) Take $i_0$ so large that $I_{i, d} = I_{i_0, d}$ for all $i \geq i_0$ and all $d$. Suppose $f \in J_ i$ for some $i \geq i_0$. By induction on the degree $d = \deg (f)$ we show that $f \in J_{i_0}$. Namely, there exists a $g\in J_{i_0}$ whose degree is $d$ and which has the same leading coefficient as $f$. By induction $f - g \in J_{i_0}$ and we win. $\square$

Lemma 10.31.2. If $R$ is a Noetherian ring, then so is the formal power series ring $R[[x_1, \ldots , x_ n]]$.

Proof. Since $R[[x_1, \ldots , x_{n + 1}]] \cong R[[x_1, \ldots , x_ n]][[x_{n + 1}]]$ it suffices to prove the statement that $R[[x]]$ is Noetherian if $R$ is Noetherian. Let $I \subset R[[x]]$ be a ideal. We have to show that $I$ is a finitely generated ideal. For each integer $d$ denote $I_ d = \{ a \in R \mid ax^ d + \text{h.o.t.} \in I\} $. Then we see that $I_0 \subset I_1 \subset \ldots $ stabilizes as $R$ is Noetherian. Choose $d_0$ such that $I_{d_0} = I_{d_0 + 1} = \ldots $. For each $d \leq d_0$ choose elements $f_{d, j} \in I \cap (x^ d)$, $j = 1, \ldots , n_ d$ such that if we write $f_{d, j} = a_{d, j}x^ d + \text{h.o.t}$ then $I_ d = (a_{d, j})$. Denote $I' = (\{ f_{d, j}\} _{d = 0, \ldots , d_0, j = 1, \ldots , n_ d})$. Then it is clear that $I' \subset I$. Pick $f \in I$. First we may choose $c_{d, i} \in R$ such that

\[ f - \sum c_{d, i} f_{d, i} \in (x^{d_0 + 1}) \cap I. \]

Next, we can choose $c_{i, 1} \in R$, $i = 1, \ldots , n_{d_0}$ such that

\[ f - \sum c_{d, i} f_{d, i} - \sum c_{i, 1}xf_{d_0, i} \in (x^{d_0 + 2}) \cap I. \]

Next, we can choose $c_{i, 2} \in R$, $i = 1, \ldots , n_{d_0}$ such that

\[ f - \sum c_{d, i} f_{d, i} - \sum c_{i, 1}xf_{d_0, i} - \sum c_{i, 2}x^2f_{d_0, i} \in (x^{d_0 + 3}) \cap I. \]

And so on. In the end we see that

\[ f = \sum c_{d, i} f_{d, i} + \sum \nolimits _ i (\sum \nolimits _ e c_{i, e} x^ e)f_{d_0, i} \]

is contained in $I'$ as desired. $\square$

The following lemma, although easy, is useful because finite type $\mathbf{Z}$-algebras come up quite often in a technique called “absolute Noetherian reduction”.

Lemma 10.31.3. Any finite type algebra over a field is Noetherian. Any finite type algebra over $\mathbf{Z}$ is Noetherian.

Proof. This is immediate from Lemma 10.31.1 and the fact that fields are Noetherian rings and that $\mathbf{Z}$ is Noetherian ring (because it is a principal ideal domain). $\square$

Lemma 10.31.4. Let $R$ be a Noetherian ring.

  1. Any finite $R$-module is of finite presentation.

  2. Any submodule of a finite $R$-module is finite.

  3. Any finite type $R$-algebra is of finite presentation over $R$.

Proof. Let $M$ be a finite $R$-module. By Lemma 10.5.4 we can find a finite filtration of $M$ whose successive quotients are of the form $R/I$. Since any ideal is finitely generated, each of the quotients $R/I$ is finitely presented. Hence $M$ is finitely presented by Lemma 10.5.3. This proves (1).

Let $N \subset M$ be a submodule. As $M$ is finite, the quotient $M/N$ is finite. Thus $M/N$ is of finite presentation by part (1). Thus we see that $N$ is finite by Lemma 10.5.3 part (5). This proves part (2).

To see (3) note that any ideal of $R[x_1, \ldots , x_ n]$ is finitely generated by Lemma 10.31.1. $\square$

Lemma 10.31.5. If $R$ is a Noetherian ring then $\mathop{\mathrm{Spec}}(R)$ is a Noetherian topological space, see Topology, Definition 5.9.1.

Proof. This is because any closed subset of $\mathop{\mathrm{Spec}}(R)$ is uniquely of the form $V(I)$ with $I$ a radical ideal, see Lemma 10.17.2. And this correspondence is inclusion reversing. Thus the result follows from the definitions. $\square$

slogan

Lemma 10.31.6. If $R$ is a Noetherian ring then $\mathop{\mathrm{Spec}}(R)$ has finitely many irreducible components. In other words $R$ has finitely many minimal primes.

Proof. By Lemma 10.31.5 and Topology, Lemma 5.9.2 we see there are finitely many irreducible components. By Lemma 10.26.1 these correspond to minimal primes of $R$. $\square$

Lemma 10.31.7. Let $R \to S$ be a ring map. Let $R \to R'$ be of finite type. If $S$ is Noetherian, then the base change $S' = R' \otimes _ R S$ is Noetherian.

Proof. By Lemma 10.14.2 finite type is stable under base change. Thus $S \to S'$ is of finite type. Since $S$ is Noetherian we can apply Lemma 10.31.1. $\square$

Lemma 10.31.8. Let $k$ be a field and let $R$ be a Noetherian $k$-algebra. If $K/k$ is a finitely generated field extension then $K \otimes _ k R$ is Noetherian.

Proof. Since $K/k$ is a finitely generated field extension, there exists a finitely generated $k$-algebra $B \subset K$ such that $K$ is the fraction field of $B$. In other words, $K = S^{-1}B$ with $S = B \setminus \{ 0\} $. Then $K \otimes _ k R = S^{-1}(B \otimes _ k R)$. Then $B \otimes _ k R$ is Noetherian by Lemma 10.31.7. Finally, $K \otimes _ k R = S^{-1}(B \otimes _ k R)$ is Noetherian by Lemma 10.31.1. $\square$

Here are some fun lemmas that are sometimes useful.

Lemma 10.31.9. Let $R$ be a ring and $\mathfrak p \subset R$ be a prime. There exists an $f \in R$, $f \not\in \mathfrak p$ such that $R_ f \to R_\mathfrak p$ is injective in each of the following cases

  1. $R$ is a domain,

  2. $R$ is Noetherian, or

  3. $R$ is reduced and has finitely many minimal primes.

Proof. If $R$ is a domain, then $R \subset R_\mathfrak p$, hence $f = 1$ works. If $R$ is Noetherian, then the kernel $I$ of $R \to R_\mathfrak p$ is a finitely generated ideal and we can find $f \in R$, $f \not\in \mathfrak p$ such that $IR_ f = 0$. For this $f$ the map $R_ f \to R_\mathfrak p$ is injective and $f$ works. If $R$ is reduced with finitely many minimal primes $\mathfrak p_1, \ldots , \mathfrak p_ n$, then we can choose $f \in \bigcap _{\mathfrak p_ i \not\subset \mathfrak p} \mathfrak p_ i$, $f \not\in \mathfrak p$. Indeed, if $\mathfrak {p}_ i\not\subset \mathfrak {p}$ then there exist $f_ i \in \mathfrak {p}_ i$, $f_ i \not\in \mathfrak {p}$ and $f = \prod f_ i$ works. For this $f$ we have $R_ f \subset R_\mathfrak p$ because the minimal primes of $R_ f$ correspond to minimal primes of $R_\mathfrak p$ and we can apply Lemma 10.25.2 (some details omitted). $\square$

Lemma 10.31.10. Any surjective endomorphism of a Noetherian ring is an isomorphism.

Proof. If $f : R \to R$ were such an endomorphism but not injective, then

\[ \mathop{\mathrm{Ker}}(f) \subset \mathop{\mathrm{Ker}}(f \circ f) \subset \mathop{\mathrm{Ker}}(f \circ f \circ f) \subset \ldots \]

would be a strictly increasing chain of ideals. $\square$


Comments (0)


Post a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked.

In your comment you can use Markdown and LaTeX style mathematics (enclose it like $\pi$). A preview option is available if you wish to see how it works out (just click on the eye in the toolbar).

Unfortunately JavaScript is disabled in your browser, so the comment preview function will not work.

All contributions are licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.




In order to prevent bots from posting comments, we would like you to prove that you are human. You can do this by filling in the name of the current tag in the following input field. As a reminder, this is tag 00FM. Beware of the difference between the letter 'O' and the digit '0'.