Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2013 iii Paper 74 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-07
Write the Cartesian comonad as , with preserving finite limits. A coalgebra for a comonad is with , and . Its forgetful functor is faithful, creates finite limits, and has the cofree coalgebra right adjoint . We construct the two remaining topos structures explicitly.
For exponential objects, take coalgebras and start with . Put , with structure , and letTranspose the following two maps into maps :using . The cofree adjunction transposes once more into coalgebra morphisms . Let be their equalizer. A coalgebra map corresponds to an arbitrary ambient map . It factors through precisely whenwhich is exactly the condition that be a coalgebra morphism. Therefore represents and is the required exponential in a coalgebra topos.
For the subobject classifier, let classify the mono . In the cofree coalgebra , formBoth arrows are coalgebra morphisms. The cofree transpose of factors through this equalizer and gives its true arrow. To verify classification, let have ambient characteristic map . It supports a subcoalgebra of exactly when it is invariant under , equivalentlyThe counit proves the reverse containment in the first equation; the forward containment supplies the restricted structure map, whose coalgebra laws follow through the mono. Under the cofree adjunction, the second equation says exactly that factors through . Pulling back its true arrow recovers , since . This proves the universal property of the subobject classifier of a coalgebra topos. Hence is a topos.
Now let be a geometric morphism, with . The comonad is Cartesian: preserves finite limits and the right adjoint preserves limits. Put , already a topos. The forgetful adjunction defines with , so is faithful.
The comparison functorpreserves finite limits. It has a right adjoint , given on a coalgebra byIndeed, the transposed arrow corresponds to a coalgebra map exactly when it equalizes these two maps. Applying the finite-limit-preserving shows that is the equalizer ofThat equalizer is . If equalizes the pair, then , proving the claimed universal property. Consequently the counit is invertible. The fully faithful adjoint criterion makes full and faithful.
Thus defines a geometric embedding , and identifies the composite with . The requested factorization iswhere is a surjective geometric morphism and is full and faithful.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2021 iii Paper 119 2 Solution 2026-09-28
For an adjoint functor pair , the unit and counit of an adjunction areUnder the adjunction bijection, corresponds to and corresponds to . They satisfy the triangle identitiesConversely, natural transformations with these identities recover the adjunction through the mutually inverse maps
The fully faithful adjoint criterion gives the first equivalence directly. If is full and faithful, there is a unique with ; the triangle identity and faithfulness show that and are inverse, so the unit is an isomorphism. If the unit is an isomorphism, the displayed adjunction bijection shows thatis bijective, so is full and faithful. This also proves that either condition gives a natural isomorphism .
For the remaining direction, suppose merely that is naturally isomorphic to the identity. Transport the monad induced by an adjunction along this isomorphism. Its underlying endofunctor is then the identity, its unit is a natural endomorphism , and its multiplication is a natural endomorphism with . Naturality makes commute with , so also . Hence the transported unit, and therefore , is an isomorphism. The three conditions are equivalent.
Now let . If is full and faithful, then . For , the two adjunctions give natural bijectionsThe Yoneda lemma therefore gives , naturally in . The fully faithful adjoint criterion applied to shows that is full and faithful. Conversely, if is full and faithful, then andAnother application of the Yoneda lemma gives , so is full and faithful. Thus is full and faithful exactly when is.
Assume henceforth that is full and faithful. Then the counit and unit are natural isomorphisms. ConsiderApplying the faithful functor , then using naturality and the four triangle identities, turns both composites intoTherefore ; denote their common value by , the double-adjoint comparison transformation.
The pointwise monicity criterion is clearest from the following natural square, in which both vertical maps are bijections:The left vertical map is the adjunction , while the right one precomposes with the isomorphism . Thus every is a monomorphism exactly when is faithful on all morphisms , namely morphisms whose domains lie in the image of .
Dually, the natural squarehas bijective vertical maps, using on the left and the isomorphism on the right. Hence every is an epimorphism exactly when is faithful on all morphisms , namely morphisms whose codomains lie in the image of .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2023 iii Paper 119 2 Solution 2026-09-28
A balanced category is one in which every morphism that is both a monomorphism and an epimorphism is an isomorphism. A faithful functor reflects monomorphisms and epimorphisms: cancellation after applying the functor can be pulled back by injectivity on hom-sets. Therefore, if is faithful, is balanced, and is an isomorphism, then is both monic and epic and hence is an isomorphism. Thus reflects isomorphisms.
Now let be an adjunction with unit and counit . Under the adjunction bijectionthe morphism corresponds to . If is faithful and , then and hence , so every is monic. Conversely, if every is monic and for , naturality givesand monicity gives . This proves the faithful left adjoint criterion.
Assume next that is balanced, every arrow in factors as a strong epimorphism followed by a monomorphism, and both and are pointwise monic. The unit criterion makes faithful. The triangle identitymakes the monomorphism a split epimorphism, hence an isomorphism. Thus is an isomorphism. The first paragraph shows that reflects isomorphisms, so is an isomorphism for every . By the fully faithful adjoint criterion, is full and faithful.
To prove closure under strong quotients, let be a strong epimorphism. Naturality givesThe right side is a strong epimorphism, while is monic. The lifting property supplies withSince is also monic, it is an isomorphism. Hence lies in the essential image of .
Conversely, assume is full and faithful and its image is closed under strong quotients. Then is an isomorphism and in particular pointwise monic. Factor a counit component aswith strong epic and monic. Closure under strong quotients gives for some . After choosing this isomorphism, fullness writes for a map . Since is epic and is faithful, is epic. The transpose ofis , soThus is also monic. Balancedness makes an isomorphism, hence is an isomorphism and is monic. This proves the pointwise-monic unit-and-counit criterion.
Balancedness is necessary. Let be the two-element poset , viewed as a category, and let be the terminal category. The unique is left adjoint to the functor selecting . Every morphism in a poset is monic, so the unit and counit are pointwise monic. But is not full: the unique arrow has no preimage . This is the pointwise-monic adjunction over a non-balanced poset.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2025 iii Paper 119 2 Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-09-25
For with , the unit and counit of an adjunction areobtained by transposing identity morphisms. They satisfy the triangular identities and .
If is full and faithful, fullness gives a map with ; the second triangular identity and faithfulness show that is inverse to . Conversely, if is an isomorphism, then for the unique arrow whose transpose is iswhich proves that is full, and the triangular identities prove faithfulness. Hence (i) and (ii) are equivalent. Condition (ii) immediately gives (iii). Conversely, a natural isomorphism combines with the adjunction bijection to show naturally that is bijective; by naturality and the triangular identities this is the map induced by up to invertible natural conjugation, so is full and faithful. Thus all three conditions are equivalent.
Suppose . If is full and faithful, the unit is an isomorphism. For in the codomain of , the two adjunctions then give natural bijectionsBy the Yoneda lemma, the counit is an isomorphism, so the fully faithful adjoint criterion makes full and faithful. The converse is dual.
Now assume is full and faithful. For , its counit is invertible; for , its unit is invertible. DefineApplying , then using naturality and the triangular identities, reduces this composite to the same map asSince is faithful, the two displayed composites are equal.
For a morphism , let be its transpose under . The identities just proved giveIf every is monic and , this equation gives , hence ; thus is faithful on arrows whose domains are in the image of . Conversely, if for , naturality of and the second formula for giveBoth maps have domain , so the assumed faithfulness gives . These are the transposes of and , hence . Therefore is pointwise monic exactly under the stated faithfulness condition.