Span, cospan, and other double categories

Susan Niefield

Given a double category $\mathbb D$ such that $\mathbb D_0$ has pushouts, we characterize oplax/lax adjunctions between $\mathbb D$ and $Cospan(\mathbb D_0)$ for which the right adjoint is normal and restricts to the identity on $\mathbb D_0$, where $Cospan(\mathbb D_0)$ is the double category on $\mathbb D_0$ whose vertical morphisms are cospans. We show that such a pair exists if and only if $\mathbb D$ has companions, conjoints, and 1-cotabulators. The right adjoints are induced by the companions and conjoints, and the left adjoints by the 1-cotabulators. The notion of a 1-cotabulator is a common generalization of the symmetric algebra of a module and Artin-Wraith glueing of toposes, locales, and topological spaces.

Keywords: double category, lax functor, (co)span, (co)tabulator, companion, conjoint, symmetric algebra

2010 MSC: 18D05, 18A40, 18B25, 18B30, 06D22, 18D10, 15A78

Theory and Applications of Categories, Vol. 26, 2012, No. 26, pp 729-742.

Published 2012-12-02.

http://www.tac.mta.ca/tac/volumes/26/26/26-26.dvi
http://www.tac.mta.ca/tac/volumes/26/26/26-26.ps
http://www.tac.mta.ca/tac/volumes/26/26/26-26.pdf
ftp://ftp.tac.mta.ca/pub/tac/html/volumes/26/26/26-26.dvi
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