Bimonoidal categories are categorical analogues of rings without additive inverses. They have been actively studied in category theory, homotopy theory, and algebraic \(K\)-theory since around 1970. There is an abundance of new applications and questions of bimonoidal categories in mathematics and other sciences. The three books published by the AMS in the Mathematical Surveys and Monographs series under the title Bimonoidal Categories, \(E_n\)-Monoidal Categories, and Algebraic \(K\)-Theory (Volume I: Symmetric Bimonoidal Categories and Monoidal Bicategories, Volume II: Braided Bimonoidal Categories with Applications—this book, and Volume III: From Categories to Structured Ring Spectra) provide a unified treatment of bimonoidal and higher ring-like categories, their connection with algebraic \(K\)-theory and homotopy theory, and applications to quantum groups and topological quantum computation. With ample background material, extensive coverage, detailed presentation of both well-known and new theorems, and a list of open questions, this work is a user-friendly resource for beginners and experts alike.

Part 1 of this book studies braided bimonoidal categories, with applications to quantum groups and topological quantum computation. It is proved that the categories of modules over a braided bialgebra, of Fibonacci anyons, and of Ising anyons form braided bimonoidal categories. Two coherence theorems for braided bimonoidal categories are proved, confirming the Blass-Gurevich Conjecture. The rest of this part discusses braided analogues of Baez's Conjecture and the monoidal bicategorical matrix construction in Volume I: Symmetric Bimonoidal Categories and Monoidal Bicategories. Part 2 studies ring and bipermutative categories in the sense of Elmendorf-Mandell, braided ring categories, and \(E_n\)-monoidal categories, which combine \(n\)-fold monoidal categories with ring categories.