Algebraic entropy for amenable semigroup actions

Abstract

We introduce two notions of algebraic entropy for actions of cancellative right amenable semigroups $S$ on discrete abelian groups $A$ by endomorphisms; these extend the classical algebraic entropy for endomorphisms of abelian groups, corresponding to the case $S=\mathbb N$. We investigate the fundamental properties of the algebraic entropy and compute it in several examples, paying special attention to the case when S is an amenable group. For actions of cancellative right amenable monoids on torsion abelian groups, we prove the so called Addition Theorem. In the same setting, we see that a Bridge Theorem connects the algebraic entropy with the topological entropy of the dual action by means of the Pontryagin duality, so that we derive an Addition Theorem for the topological entropy of actions of cancellative left amenable monoids on totally disconnected compact abelian groups.