Field-dependent homological behavior of finite dimensional algebras

It is shown that the little finitistic dimension of a finite dimensional algebra, i.e., the supremum of the finite projective dimensions attained on finitely generated modules, is not necessarily attained on a cyclic module. In general, arbitrarily high numbers of generators are required. Moreover, it is demonstrated that this phenomenon may depend on the base fieldk. In fact, for each integerd>-3, there exists a quiver Γ with a set ρ of paths such that the little finitistic dimension of the finite dimensional algebrakΓ/<ρ> is attained on a cyclic module precisely when |k|≥d. By contrast, the global dimension of finite dimensional monomial relation algebras does not depend on the base field. This research was partially supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation.