Projective dimension and commuting variety of a reductive Lie algebra

Abstract

The commuting variety of a reductive Lie algebra $\mathfrak{g}$ is the underlying variety of a well defined subscheme of $\mathfrak{g}\times\mathfrak{g}$. In this note, it is proved that this scheme is normal and Cohen-Macaulay. In particular, its ideal of definition is a prime ideal. As a matter of fact, this theorem results from a so called Property (P) for a simple Lie algebra. This property says that some cohomology complexes are exact.