Injective Hulls of Torsion Free Modules

In § 1, we begin with a basic theorem which describes a convenient embedding of a nonsingular left R-module into a complete direct product of copies of the left injective hull of R (Theorem 2). Several applications follow immediately. Notably, the injective hull of a finitely generated nonsingular left R-module is isomorphic to a direct sum of injective hulls of closed left ideals of R (Corollary 4). In particular, when R is left self-injective, every finitely generated nonsingular left R-module is isomorphic to a finite direct sum of injective left ideals (Corollary 6).In § 2, where it is assumed for the first time that rings have identity elements, we investigate more generally the class of left R-modules which are embeddable in direct products of copies of the left injective hull Q of R. Such modules are called torsion free, and can also be characterized by the property that no nonzero element is annihilated by a dense left ideal of R (Proposition 12).