The Lawson number of a semitopological semilattice

Abstract: For a Hausdorff topologized semilattice $X$ its $Lawson\;\; number$ $\bar\Lambda(X)$ is the smallest cardinal $\kappa$ such that for any distinct points $x,y\in X$ there exists a family $\mathcal U$ of closed neighborhoods of $x$ in $X$ such that $|\mathcal U|\le\kappa$ and $\bigcap\mathcal U$ is a subsemilattice of $X$ that does not contain $y$. It follows that $\bar\Lambda(X)\le\bar\psi(X)$, where $\bar\psi(X)$ is the smallest cardinal $\kappa$ such that for any point $x\in X$ there exists a family $\mathcal U$ of closed neighborhoods of $x$ in $X$ such that $|\mathcal U|\le\kappa$ and $\bigcap\mathcal U={x}$. We prove that a compact Hausdorff semitopological semilattice $X$ is Lawson (i.e., has a base of the topology consisting of subsemilattices) if and only if $\bar\Lambda(X)=1$. Each Hausdorff topological semilattice $X$ has Lawson number $\bar\Lambda(X)\le\omega$. On the other hand, for any infinite cardinal $\lambda$ we construct a Hausdorff zero-dimensional semitopological semilattice $X$ such that $|X|=\lambda$ and $\bar\Lambda(X)=\bar\psi(X)=cf(\lambda)$. A topologized semilattice $X$ is called (i) $\omega$-$Lawson$ if $\bar\Lambda(X)\le\omega$; (ii) $complete$ if each non-empty chain $C\subset X$ has $\inf C\in\overline{C}$ and $\sup C\in\overline{C}$. We prove that for any complete subsemilattice $X$ of an $\omega$-Lawson semitopological semilattice $Y$, the partial order $\le_X={(x,y)\in X\times X:xy=x}$ of $X$ is closed in $Y\times Y$ and hence $X$ is closed in $Y$. This implies that for any continuous homomorphism $h:X\to Y$ from a compete topologized semilattice $X$ to an $\omega$-Lawson semitopological semilattice $Y$ the image $h(X)$ is closed in $Y$.