The word problem for semigroups satisfying x3 = x

Abstract

In the paper (4) of Green and Rees it was established that the finiteness of finitely generated semigroups satisfying xr = x is equivalent to the finiteness of finitely generated groups satisfying xr−1 = 1 (Burnside's Problem). A group satisfying x2 = 1 is abelian and if it is generated by n elements, it has at most 2n elements. The free finitely generated semigroups satisfying x3 = x are thus established to be finite, and in fact the connexion with the corresponding problem for groups can be used to give an upper bound on the size of these semigroups. This is a long way from an algorithm for a solution of the word problem however, and providing such an algorithm is the purpose of the present paper. The case x = x3 is of interest since the corresponding result for x = x2 was done by Green and Rees (4) and independently by McLean(6).