Structure of Rings Whose Potent Elements are Central

Abstract

We study the structure of potent elements in matrix rings with same diagonals and polynomial rings, motivated by Jacobson's theorem of commutativity. A ring shall be said to be PC if every potent element is central. We investigate the structure of PC rings in relation to the commutativity of rings. It is proved that if $R$ is a PC ring of prime characteristic then the polynomial ring over $R$ is also a PC ring. Every periodic PC ring is shown to be commutative.