Lifting Markov bases and higher codimension toric fiber products

We study how to lift Markov bases and Gröbner bases along linear maps of lattices. We give a lifting algorithm that allows to compute such bases iteratively provided a certain associated semigroup is normal. Our main application is the toric fiber product of toric ideals, where lifting gives Markov bases of the factor ideals that satisfy the compatible projection property. We illustrate the technique by computing Markov bases of various infinite families of hierarchical models. The methodology also implies new finiteness results for iterated toric fiber products.