Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2026/iii/paper-111/3/d/solution

There is a missing hypothesis in the printed claim: it is false when every irreducible component of has type . The intended statement holds as soon as has an irreducible component of rank at least two, which we now assume.
Since , every Hecke parameter of a BN-pair vanishes in , and is the 0-Hecke algebra with
Let be the Longest element of a finite Coxeter group. Choose a simple generator in a component of rank at least two, put
The element is again a simple generator. The identities and give
If is simple, then is a left descent of both and : using , one gets . Hence
The one-dimensional subspace is therefore a left ideal. It is nonzero because and are distinct basis elements.
Every reduced expression in a Coxeter group for contains : in an irreducible finite component of rank at least two, deleting one final generator from does not remove any vertex from its support. A reduced expression for contains as well. Since , associativity now gives
If were a semisimple algebra, the left ideal would be a direct summand of the regular module. The corresponding projection would produce a nonzero idempotent in , impossible because . Thus is not semisimple.
For completeness, if , then
which is semisimple. This is the counterexample showing why the omitted rank condition is necessary.
Solved by gpt-5.6-sol high.

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