We propose a reformulation of the ideal $\mathcal {N}$ of Lebesgue measure zero sets of reals modulo an ideal J on $\omega $, which we denote by $\mathcal {N}_J$. In the same way, we reformulate the ideal $\mathcal {E}$ generated by $F_\sigma $ measure zero sets of reals modulo J, which we denote by $\mathcal {N}^*_J$. We show that these are $\sigma $-ideals and that $\mathcal {N}_J=\mathcal {N}$ iff J has the Baire property, which in turn is equivalent to $\mathcal {N}^*_J=\mathcal {E}$. Moreover, we prove that $\mathcal {N}_J$ does not contain co-meager sets and $\mathcal {N}^*_J$ contains non-meager sets when J does not have the Baire property. We also prove a deep connection between these ideals modulo J and the notion of nearly coherence of filters (or ideals).

We also study the cardinal characteristics associated with $\mathcal {N}_J$ and $\mathcal {N}^*_J$. We show their position with respect to Cichoń’s diagram and prove consistency results in connection with other very classical cardinal characteristics of the continuum, leaving just very few open questions. To achieve this, we discovered a new characterization of $\mathrm {add}(\mathcal {N})$ and $\mathrm {cof}(\mathcal {N})$. We also show that, in Cohen model, we can obtain many different values to the cardinal characteristics associated with our new ideals.

We continue investigating variants of the splitting and reaping numbers introduced in [4]. In particular, answering a question raised there, we prove the consistency of and of . Moreover, we discuss their natural generalisations $\mathfrak {s}_{\rho }$ and $\mathfrak {r}_{\rho }$ for $\rho \in (0,1)$, and show that $\mathfrak {r}_{\rho }$ does not depend on $\rho $.

For which infinite cardinals $\kappa $ is there a partition of the real line ${\mathbb R}$ into precisely $\kappa $ Borel sets? Work of Lusin, Souslin, and Hausdorff shows that ${\mathbb R}$ can be partitioned into $\aleph _1$ Borel sets. But other than this, we show that the spectrum of possible sizes of partitions of ${\mathbb R}$ into Borel sets can be fairly arbitrary. For example, given any $A \subseteq \omega $ with $0,1 \in A$, there is a forcing extension in which ${A = \{ n :\, \text {there is a partition of } {{\mathbb R}} \text { into }\aleph _n\text { Borel sets}\}}$. We also look at the corresponding question for partitions of ${\mathbb R}$ into closed sets. We show that, like with partitions into Borel sets, the set of all uncountable $\kappa $ such that there is a partition of ${\mathbb R}$ into precisely $\kappa $ closed sets can be fairly arbitrary.

A union ultrafilter is an ultrafilter over the finite subsets of ω that has a base of sets of the form ${\text{FU}}\left( X \right)$, where X is an infinite pairwise disjoint family and ${\text{FU}}(X) = \left\{ {\bigcup {F|F} \in [X]^{ < \omega } \setminus \{ \emptyset \} } \right\}$. The existence of these ultrafilters is not provable from the $ZFC$ axioms, but is known to follow from the assumption that ${\text{cov}}\left( \mathcal{M} \right) = \mathfrak{c}$. In this article we obtain various models of $ZFC$ that satisfy the existence of union ultrafilters while at the same time ${\text{cov}}\left( \mathcal{M} \right) = \mathfrak{c}$.

We prove the consistency of

$$~~\text{add}\left( \mathcal{N} \right)<\operatorname{cov}\left( \mathcal{N} \right)<\mathfrak{p}\text{=}\mathfrak{s}\text{=}\mathfrak{g}< \text{add}\left( \mathcal{M} \right)=\text{cof}\left( \mathcal{M} \right)<\mathfrak{a}=\mathfrak{r}=\text{non}\left( N \right)=\mathfrak{c}$$

$\text{ZFC}$