Totally acyclic complexes over noetherian schemes

Abstract

We define a notion of total acyclicity for complexes of flat quasi-coherent sheaves on a semi-separated noetherian scheme, and study these complexes using the pure derived category of flat quasi-coherent sheaves. We prove that a scheme is Gorenstein if and only if every acyclic complex of flat quasi-coherent sheaves is totally acyclic. Our formalism also removes the need for a dualising complex in several known results for rings, including Jørgensen's proof of the existence of Gorenstein projective precovers. © 2010 Elsevier Inc.