This article is about a mathematical concept. For the architectural concept, see arcology.
Hyperstructures are algebraic structures equipped with at least one multi-valued operation, called a hyperoperation. The largest classes of the hyperstructures are the ones called – structures.
A hyperoperation on a nonemptyset is a mapping from to the nonempty power set, meaning the set of all nonempty subsets of , i.e.
For we define
and
is a semihypergroup if is an associative hyperoperation, i.e. for all
Furthermore, a hypergroup is a semihypergroup , where the reproduction axiom is valid, i.e.
for all