Universal central extensions of internal crossed modules via the non-abelian tensor product

Abstract

In the context of internal crossed modules over a fixed base object in a given semi-abelian category, we use the non-abelian tensor product in order to prove that an object is perfect (in an appropriate sense) if and only if it admits a universal central extension. This extends results of Brown-Loday (in the case of groups) and Edalatzadeh (in the case of Lie algebras). Our aim is to explain how those results can be understood in terms of categorical Galois theory: Edalatzadeh's interpretation in terms of quasi-pointed categories applies, but a more straightforward approach based on the theory developed in a pointed setting by Casas and the second author works as well.