A ribbon Hopf algebra
is a quasitriangular Hopf algebra which possess an invertible central element
more commonly known as the ribbon element, such that the following conditions hold: where
Note that the element u exists for any quasitriangular Hopf algebra, and
must always be central and satisfies
, so that all that is required is that it have a central square root with the above properties.
Here We assume that the underlying field
is finite-dimensional, one could equivalently call it ribbon Hopf if and only if its category of (say, left) modules is ribbon; if
is finite-dimensional and quasi-triangular, then it is ribbon if and only if its category of (say, left) modules is pivotal.