Simple omega-categories and chain complexes

Abstract

The category of strict omega-categories has an important full subcategory whose objects are the simple omega-categories freely generated by planar trees or by globular cardinals. We give a simple description of this subcategory in terms of chain complexes, and we give a similar description of the opposite category, the category of finite discs, in terms of cochain complexes. Berger has shown that the category of simple omega-categories has a filtration by iterated wreath products of the simplex category. We generalise his result by considering wreath products of categories of chain complexes over the simplex category.