Phrase guide

Kan extension

noun · 1 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot

Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.

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Pronunciation

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1

noun

Meaning 1

A construct that generalizes the notion of extending a function's domain of definition.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Topics: category-theory, computing, engineering, mathematics, natural-sciences, physical-sciences, sciences

Examples

  • 2010, Matthew Ando, Andrew J. Blumberg, David Gepner, Twists of K-Theory and TMF, Robert S. Doran, Greg Friedman, Jonathan Rosenberg, Superstrings, Geometry, Topology, and C*-algebras, American Mathematical Society, page 34, Moreover, f∗ admits both a left adjoint f_! and a right adjoint f_∗, given by left and right Kan extension along the map SingY→SingX, respectively. Note that this is left and right Kan extension in the ∞-categorical sense, which amounts to homotopy left and right Kan extension on the level of simplicial categories or model categories.
  • 2012, Rolf Hinze, Kan Extensions for Program Optimisation, Or: Art and Dan Explain an Old Trick, Jeremy Gibbons, Pablo Nogueira (editors), Mathematics of Program Construction: 11th International Conference, MPC 2012, Proceedings, Springer, Lecture Notes in Computer Science: 7342, page 336, We can specialise Kan extensions to the preorder setting, if we equip a preorder with a monoidal structure: an associative operation that is monotone and that has a neutral element.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

History

Etymology

Named after Jewish and Dutch mathematician Daniel M. Kan (1927–2013), who constructed certain (Kan) extensions using limits in 1960.

Across languages

Translations

1 source translations are retained for this English entry.

  • French: extension de Kan — construct that generalizes the extending of a function's domain of definition