Definable Categories

Abstract

We introduce the notion of a definable category--a category equivalent to a full subcategory of a locally finitely presentable category that is closed under products, directed colimits and pure subobjects. Definable subcategories are precisely the finite-injectivity classes. We prove a $2$-duality between the $2$-category of small exact categories and the $2$-category of definable categories, and provide a new proof of its additive version. We further introduce a third vertex of the $2$-category of regular toposes and show that the diagram of $2$-(anti-)equivalences between three $2$-categories commutes, the corresponding additive triangle is well-known.