Cyclic Lie-Rinehart algebras

Abstract

We study Lie-Rinehart algebra structures in the framework provided by a duality pairing of modules over a unital commutative associative algebra. Thus, we construct examples of Lie brackets corresponding to a fixed anchor map whose image is a cyclic submodule of the derivation module, and therefore we call them cyclic Lie-Rinehart algebras. In a very special case of our construction, these brackets turn out to be related to certain differential operators that occur in mathematical physics.