The first book on commutative semigroups was Redei's The theory of .finitely generated commutative semigroups, published in Budapest in 1956. Subsequent years have brought much progress. By 1975 the structure of finite commutative semigroups was fairly well understood. Recent results have perfected this understanding and extended it to finitely generated semigroups. Today's coherent and powerful structure theory is the central subject of the present book. 1. Commutative semigroups are more important than is suggested by the stan dard examples ofsemigroups, which consist ofvarious kinds...

This work offers concise coverage of the structure theory of semigroups. It examines constructions and descriptions of semigroups and emphasizes finite, commutative, regular and inverse semigroups. Many structure theorems on regular and commutative semigroups are introduced.;College or university bookstores may order five or more copies at a special student price which is available upon request from Marcel Dekker, Inc.