A categorical Connes' $\chi(M)$

Abstract

Popa introduced the tensor category $\tilde{\chi}(M)$ of approximately inner, centrally trivial bimodules of a $\rm{II}_{1}$ factor $M$, generalizing Connes' $\chi(M)$. We extend Popa's notions to define the $\rm W^*$-tensor category $\operatorname{End}_{\rm loc}(\mathcal{C})$ of local endofunctors on a $\rm W^*$-category $\mathcal{C}$. We construct a unitary braiding on $\operatorname{End}_{\rm loc}(\mathcal{C})$, giving a new construction of a braided tensor category associated to an arbitrary $\rm W^*$-category. For the $\rm W^*$-category of finite modules over a $\rm{II}_{1}$ factor, this yields a unitary braiding on Popa's $\tilde{\chi}(M)$, which extends Jones' $\kappa$ invariant for $\chi(M)$. Given a finite depth inclusion $M_{0}\subseteq M_{1}$ of non-Gamma $\rm{II}_1$ factors, we show that the braided unitary tensor category $\tilde{\chi}(M_{\infty})$ is equivalent to the Drinfeld center of the standard invariant, where $M_{\infty}$ is the inductive limit of the associated Jones tower. This implies that for any pair of finite depth non-Gamma subfactors $N_{0}\subseteq N_{1}$ and $M_{0}\subseteq M_{1}$, if the standard invariants are not Morita equivalent, then the inductive limit factors $N_{\infty}$ and $M_{\infty}$ are not stably isomorphic.