Student Colloquium

Blake Madill, Department of Pure Mathematics, University of Waterloo

"Köthe's conjecture, ideals, radicals, and all things nil"

In this talk we present one of the most famous open problems
in ring theory: Köthe's Conjecture. In 1930, Köthe conjectured that if a
ring R has no nonzero nil ideals then R has no nonzero nil right (or
left) ideals. As we shall see, this is equivalent to numerous related
statements involving nil ideals, nil radicals, and radicals of related
rings. We give arguments both for and against the conjecture of Köthe.
If we solve this open problem during the colloquium, we will all get
jobs. #unlikely #openproblems #90yearoldproblem

M3-2134