Noncommutative differential operators, Sobolev spaces and the centre of a category

Abstract

We consider differential operators over a noncommutative algebra $A$ generated by vector fields. These are shown to form a unital associative algebra of differential operators, and act on $A$-modules $E$ with covariant derivative. We use the repeated differentials given in the paper to give a definition of noncommutative Sobolev space for modules with connection and Hermitian inner product. The tensor algebra of vector fields, with a modified bimodule structure and a bimodule connection, is shown to lie in the centre of the bimodule connection category ${}_A\mathcal{E}_A$, and in fact to be an algebra in the centre. The crossing natural transformation in the definition of the centre of the category is related to the action of the differential operators on bimodules with connection.