WEAKLY CONTINUOUS AND C2-RINGS

A ring R is called right weakly continuous if the right annihilator of each element is essential in a summand of R, and R satisfies the right C2-condition (every right ideal that is isomorphic to a direct summand of R is itself a direct summand). We show that a ring R is right weakly continuous if and only if it is semiregular and J(R) = Z(R _R ). Unlike right continuous rings, these right weakly continuous rings form a Morita invariant class. The rings satisfying the right C2-condition are studied and used to investigate two conjectures about strongly right Johns rings and right FGF-rings and their relation to quasi-Frobenius rings.