Properties of LCM Lattices of Monomial Ideals

Abstract: LCM lattices were introduced by Gasharov, Peeva, and Welker as a way to study minimal free resolutions of monomial ideals. All LCM lattices are atomic and all atomic lattices arise as the LCM lattice of some monomial ideal. We systematically study other lattice properties of LCM lattices. For lattices associated to the edge ideal of a graph, we completely characterize the many standard lattice properties in terms of the associated graphs: Boolean, modular, upper semimodular, lower semimodular, supersolvable, coatomic, and complemented; edge ideals with graded LCM lattices were previously characterized by Nevo and Peeva as those associated to gap-free graphs. Such a characterization for arbitrary monomial ideals appears to be out of reach. However, we prove the Cohen-Macaulayness of minimal monomial ideals associated to modular lattices. We also prove separate necessary and sufficient lattice conditions for when the projective dimension of a monomial ideal matches the height of its LCM lattice.