A group is boundedly simple if, for some constant N, every nontrivial conjugacy class generates the whole group in N steps. For a large class of trees, Tits proved simplicity of a canonical subgroup of the automorphism group, which is generated by pointwise stabilizers of edges. We prove that only for uniform subdivisions of biregular trees are such groups boundedly simple. In fact these groups are 8-boundedly simple. As a consequence, we prove that if G is boundedly simple (or from a certain class K) and G acts by automorphisms on a tree, then G fixes some vertex of A, or stabilizes some end of A, or the smallest nonempty G-invariant subtree of A is a uniform subdivision of a biregular tree.
Outer automorphism groups of RAAGs, denoted $Out(A_Γ)$, interpolate between $Out(F_n)$ and $GL_n(\mathbb{Z})$. We consider several vastness properties for which $Out(F_n)$ behaves very differently from $GL_n(\mathbb{Z})$: virtually mapping onto all finite groups, SQ-universality, virtually having an infinite dimensional space of homogeneous quasimorphisms, and not being boundedly generated. We give a neccessary and sufficient condition in terms of the defining graph $Γ$ for each of these properties to hold. Notably, the condition for all four properties is the same, meaning $Out(A_Γ)$ will eit…
Let $F_n$ be a free group of rank $n$. In this paper we discuss three algorithmic problems related to automorphisms of $F_2$. A word $u$ of $F_n$ is called positive if $u$ does not have negative exponents. A word $u$ in $F_n$ is called potentially positive if $ϕ(u)$ is positive for some automorphism $ϕ$ of $F_n$. We prove that there is an algorithm to decide whether or not a given word in $F_2$ is potentially positive, which gives an affirmative solution to problem F34a in [1] for the case of $F_2$. Two elements $u$ and $v$ in $F_n$ are said to be boundedly translation equivalent if the ratio …
We prove that groups acting boundedly and order-primitively on linear orders or acting extremly proximality on a Cantor set (the class including various Higman-Thomson groups and Neretin groups of almost automorphisms of regular trees, also called groups of spheromorphisms) are uniformly simple. Explicit bounds are provided.
We prove that there are groups in the constructible universe whose automorphism towers are highly malleable by forcing. This is a consequence of the fact that, under a suitable diamond hypothesis, there are sufficiently many highly rigid non-isomorphic Souslin trees whose isomorphism relation can be precisely controlled by forcing.
We determine when two almost automorphisms of a regular tree are conjugate. This is done by combining the classification of conjugacy classes in the automorphism group of a level-homogeneous tree by Gawron, Nekrashevych and Sushchansky and the solution of the conjugacy problem in Thompson's $V$ by Belk and Matucci. We also analyze dynamics of tree almost automorphisms.
We give an upper bound for the number of ``overlattices'' in the automorphism group of a tree, containing a fixed lattice with index n. For an example of a lattice in the automorphism group of a 2p-regular tree whose quotient is a loop, we obtain a lower bound of the asymptotic behavior as well.
We study properties of eigenvalues of a matrix associated with a randomly chosen partial automorphism of a regular rooted tree. We show that asymptotically, as the numbers of levels goes to infinity, the fraction of non-zero eigenvalues converges to zero in probability.
Motivated by the Bruhat and Cartan decompositions of general linear groups over local fields, double cosets of the group of label preserving automorphisms of a label-regular tree over the fixator of an end of the tree and over maximal compact open subgroups are enumerated. This enumeration is used to show that every continuous homomorphism from the automorphism group of a label-regular tree has closed range.
It is shown that a group defined by forbidding all patterns of size s+1 that do not appear in a given self-similar group of tree automorphisms is the topological closure of a self-similar, countable, regular branch group, branching over its level s stabilizer. As an application, it is shown that there are no infinite, finitely constrained, topologically finitely generated groups of binary tree automorphisms defined by forbidden patterns of size two.
We introduce the notion of the $k$-closure of a group of automorphisms of a locally finite tree, and give several examples of the construction. We show that the $k$-closure satisfies a new property of automorphism groups of trees that generalises Tits' Property $P$. We prove that, apart from some degenerate cases, any non-discrete group acting on a tree with this property contains an abstractly simple subgroup.
We introduce a new class of automorphisms $φ$ of the non-abelian free group $F_N$ of finite rank $N \geq 2$ which contains all iwips (= fully irreducible automorphisms), but also any automorphism induced by a pseudo-Anosov homeomorphism of a surface with arbitrary many boundary components. More generally, there may be subgroups of $F_N$ of rank $\geq 2$ on which $φ$ restricts to the identity. We prove some basic facts about such {\em tree-irreducible} automorphisms, and show that, together with Dehn twist automorphisms, they are the natural basic building blocks from which any automorphism of …
We prove that the tree almost automorphism groups admit exactly three commensurability classes of closed commensurated subgroups. Our proof utilizes an independently interesting characterization of subgroups of the tree almost automorphism groups which contain only periodic elements in terms of the dynamics of the action on the boundary of the tree. Our results further cover several interesting finitely generated subgroups of the tree almost automorphism groups, including the Thompson groups $F$, $T$, and $V$. We show in particular that Thompson's group $T$ has no commensurated subgroups other…
We prove that a "random" free group outer automorphism is an ageometric fully irreducible outer automorphism whose ideal Whitehead graph is a union of triangles. In particular, we show that its attracting (and repelling) tree is a nongeometric $\mathbb R$-tree all of whose branch points are trivalent
We study asymptotics of the spectral measure of a randomly chosen partial automorphism of a rooted tree. To every partial automorphism $x$ we assign its action matrix $A_x$. It is shown that the uniform distribution on eigenvalues of $A_x$ converges weakly in probability to $δ_0$ as $n \to \infty$, where $δ_0$ is the delta measure concentrated at $0$.
We introduce a class of automorphisms of rooted $d$-regular trees arising from affine actions on their boundaries viewed as infinite dimensional vector spaces. This class includes, in particular, many examples of self-similar realizations of lamplighter groups. We show that for a regular binary tree this class coincides with the normalizer of the group of all spherically homogeneous automorphisms of this tree: automorphisms whose states coincide at all vertices of each level. We study in detail a nontrivial example of an automaton group that contains an index two subgroup with elements from th…
The aim of this article is to discuss and clarify the notion of fractality for subgroups of the group of automorphisms of a regular rooted tree. For this purpose we define three types of fractality. We show that they are not equivalent, by giving explicit examples. Furthermore we present some tools that are helpful in order to determine the fractality of a given group.
The self-similar structure of the attracting subshift of a primitive substitution is carried over to the limit set of the repelling tree in the boundary of Outer Space of the corresponding irreducible outer automorphism of a free group. Thus, this repelling tree is self-similar (in the sense of graph directed constructions). Its Hausdorff dimension is computed. This reveals the fractal nature of the attracting tree in the boundary of Outer Space of an irreducible outer automorphism of a free group.
This article is an expanded version of the talks given by the authors at the Arbeitsgemeinschaft "Totally Disconnected Groups", held at Oberwolfach in October 2014. We recall the basic theory of automorphisms of trees and Tits' simplicity theorem, and present two constructions of tree groups via local actions with their basic properties: the universal group associated to a finite permutation group by M. Burger and S. Mozes, and the $k$-closures of a given group by C. Banks, M. Elder and G. Willis.
We show that tree almost automorphism groups, including Neretin groups, satisfy the analogue of the $F_\infty$-finiteness condition in the world of totally disconnected groups: They possess a cellular action on a contractible cellular complex such that the stabilizers are open and compact and the restriction of the action on each $n$-skeleton is cocompact.
A scale-multiplicative semigroup in a totally disconnected, locally compact group $G$ is one for which the restriction of the scale function on $G$ is multiplicative. The maximal scale-multiplicative semigroups in groups acting 2-transitively on the set of ends of trees without leaves are determined in this paper and shown to correspond to geometric features of the tree.
We study the conjugacy problem in the automorphism group $Aut(T)$ of a regular rooted tree $T$ and in its subgroup $FAut(T)$ of finite-state automorphisms. We show that under the contracting condition and the finiteness of what we call the orbit-signalizer, two finite-state automorphisms are conjugate in $Aut(T)$ if and only if they are conjugate in $FAut(T)$, and that this problem is decidable. We prove that both these conditions are satisfied by bounded automorphisms and establish that the (simultaneous) conjugacy problem in the group of bounded automata is decidable.
Let $T$ be a tree and $e$ an edge in $T$. If $C$ is a component of $T\setminus e$ and both $C$ and its complement are infinite we say that $C$ is a half-tree. The main result of this paper is that if $G$ is a closed subgroup of the automorphism group of $T$ and $G$ leaves no non-trivial subtree invariant and fixes no end of $T$ then the subgroup generated by the pointwise stabilizers of half-trees is topologically simple. This result is used to derive analogues of recent results of Caprace and De Medts (2011) and it is also applied in the study of the full automorphism group of a locally finit…
We study the automorphism groups of free-by-cyclic groups and show these are finitely generated in the following cases: (i) when defining automorphism has linear growth and (ii) when the rank of the underlying free group has rank at most 3. The techniques we use are actions on trees, including the trees of cylinders due to Guirardel and Levitt, the relative hyperbolicity of free-by-cyclic groups (due to Gautero and Lustig, Ghosh, and Dahmani and Li) and the filtration of the automorphisms of a group preserving a tree, following Bass and Jiang, and Levitt. Our general strategy is to produce an …
We generalize a class of groups defined by Rostislav Grigorchuk to a much larger class of groups, and provide upper and lower bounds for their word growth (they are all of intermediate growth) and period growth (under a small additional condition, they are periodic).
We consider certain groups of tree automorphisms as so-called diffeological groups. The notion of diffeology, due to Souriau, allows to endow non-manifold topological spaces, such as regular trees that we look at, with a kind of a differentiable structure that in many ways is close to that of a smooth manifold; a suitable notion of a diffeological group follows. We first study the question of what kind of a diffeological structure is the most natural to put on a regular tree in a way that the underlying topology be the standard one of the tree. We then proceed to consider the group of all auto…
We prove simplicity for incomplete rank 2 Kac-Moody groups over algebraic closures of finite fields with trivial commutation relations between root groups corresponding to prenilpotent pairs. We don't use the (yet unknown) simplicity of the corresponding finitely generated groups (i.e., when the ground field is finite). Nevertheless we use the fact that the latter groups are just infinite (modulo center).
To every automorphism w of an infinite rooted regular binary tree we associate a two variable generating function Φ_w that encodes information on the orbit structure of w. We prove that this is a rational function if w can be described by finitely many recursion relations of a particular form. We show that this condition is satisfied for all elements of the discrete iterated monodromy group Γassociated to a postcritically finite quadratic polynomial over C. For such Γwe also prove that there are only finitely many possibilities for the denominator of Φ_w, and we describe a procedure to determi…
Let Γbe a geometrically finite tree lattice. We prove a Khintchine-Sullivan type theorem for the Hausdorff measure of the points at infinity of the tree that are well approximated by the parabolic fixed points of G. Using Bruhat-Tits trees, an application is given for the Diophantine approximation of formal Laurent series in the variable 1/X over the finite field Fq by rational fractions in X over Fq, satisfying some congruence properties
The group A_{m} of automophisms of a one-rooted m-ary tree admits a diagonal monomorphism which we denote by x. Let A be an abelian state-closed (or self-similar) subgroup of A_{m}. We prove that the combined diagonal and tree-topological closure A* of A is additively a finitely presented Z_m [[x]]-module where Z_m is the ring of m-adic integers. Moreover, if A* is torsion-free then it is a finitely generated pro-m group. The group A splits over its torsion subgroup. We study in detail the case where A* corresponds to a cyclic Z_m[[x]]-module and when m is a prime number, we show A* to be conj…
The group of isometries W of a regular rooted tree, and many of its subgroups with branching structure, have groups of automorphisms induced by conjugation in W. This fact has stimulated the computation of the group of automorphisms of such well-known examples as the group G studied by R. Grigorchuk, and the group H studied by N. Gupta and the second author. In this paper, we pursue the larger theme of towers of automorphisms of groups of tree isometries such as G and H. We describe this tower for all groups acting on the binary rooted tree which decompose as infinitely iterated wreath product…
Automorphism groups of locally finite trees provide a large class of examples of simple totally disconnected locally compact groups. It is desirable to understand the connections between the global and local structure of such a group. Topologically, the local structure is given by the commensurability class of a vertex stabiliser; on the other hand, the action on the tree suggests that the local structure should correspond to the local action of a stabiliser of a vertex on its neighbours. We study the interplay between these different aspects for the special class of groups satisfying Tits' in…
Let $T$ be a locally finite tree all of whose vertices have valency at least $6$. We classify, up to isomorphism, the closed subgroups of $\mathrm{Aut}(T)$ acting $2$-transitively on the set of ends of $T$ and whose local action at each vertex contains the alternating group. The outcome of the classification for a fixed tree $T$ is a countable family of groups, all containing two remarkable subgroups: a simple subgroup of index $\leq 8$ and (the semiregular analog of) the universal locally alternating group of Burger-Mozes (with possibly infinite index). We also provide an explicit example sho…
We establish compact presentability, i.e. the locally compact version of finite presentability, for an infinite family of tree almost automorphism groups. Examples covered by our results include Neretin's group of spheromorphisms, as well as the topologically simple group containing the profinite completion of the Grigorchuk group constructed by Barnea, Ershov and Weigel. We additionally obtain an upper bound on the Dehn function of these groups in terms of the Dehn function of an embedded Higman-Thompson group. This, combined with a result of Guba, implies that the Dehn function of the Nereti…
We construct an invariant deformation retract of a deformation space of G-trees. We show that this complex is finite dimensional in certain cases and provide an example that is not finite dimensional. Using this complex we compute the automorphism group of the classical non-solvable Baumslag-Solitar groups BS(p,q). The most interesting case is when p properly divides q. Collins and Levin computed a presentation for Aut(BS(p,q)) in this case using algebraic methods. Our computation uses Bass-Serre theory to derive these presentations. Additionally, we provide a geometric argument showing Out(BS…
We study the positive theory of groups acting on trees and show that under the presence of weak small cancellation elements, the positive theory of the group is trivial, i.e. coincides with the positive theory of a non-abelian free group. Our results apply to a wide class of groups, including non-virtually solvable fundamental groups of $3$-manifold groups, generalised Baumslag-Solitar groups and almost all one-relator groups and graph products of groups. It follows that groups in the class satisfy a number of algebraic properties: for instance, their verbal subgroups have infinite width and, …
The paper is devoted to a study of certain fixed point properties, and their relatives, in the context of full automorphism groups of countable rooted trees. Namely, we study Serre's property (FA'), also called unsplittability, property (FA), the uncountable strong cofinality, and ample generics. We give a new proof of a theorem of Psaltis to the extent that automorphism groups of rooted trees are unsplittable, and show under what circumstances automorphism groups of rooted trees have uncountable strong cofinality (and thus property (FA).) Also, we prove a necessary and sufficient condition fo…
We study the group $QV$, the self-maps of the infinite $2$-edge coloured binary tree which preserve the edge and colour relations at cofinitely many locations. We introduce related groups $QF$, $QT$, $\tilde{Q}T$, and $\tilde{Q}V$, prove that $QF$, $\tilde{Q}T$, and $\tilde{Q}V$ are of type $\mathrm{F}_\infty$, and calculate finite presentations for them. We calculate the normal subgroup structure and rational homology of all $5$ groups, the Bieri--Neumann--Strebel--Renz invariants of $QF$, and discuss the relationship of all $5$ groups with other generalisations of Thompson's groups.
We give an amalgamation construction of free multiple trees with a strongly transitive automorphism group. The construction shows that any partial codistance function on a tuple of finite trees can be extended to yield multiple trees.
We characterize those countable rooted trees whose full automorphism group has uncountable strong cofinality or contains an open subgroup with ample generics.
For a fully irreducible automorphism ϕof the free group F_k we compute the asymptotics of the intersection number n \mapsto i(T,T'ϕ^n) for trees T,T' in Outer space. We also obtain qualitative information about the geometry of the Guirardel core for the trees T and T'ϕ^n for n large.
A multi-GGS-group is a group of automorphisms of a regular rooted tree, generalising the Gupta--Sidki $p$-groups. We compute the automorphism groups of all non-constant multi-GGS-groups.
The Poisson boundary of a finite direct product of affine automorphism groups of homogeneous trees is considered. The Poisson boundary is shown to be a product of ends of trees with a hitting measure for spread-out, aperiodic measures of finite first moment whose closed support generates a subgroup which is not fully exceptional. The Poisson boundary of a semi-direct product associated with every automorphism $α$ and tidy compact open subgroup $V$ in a locally compact, totally disconnected group $G$ is also shown to be the space of ends of the tree with the hitting measure under similar assump…
We prove that the group of almost-automorphisms of the infinite rooted regular $d$-ary tree $\mathcal{T}_d$ arises naturally as the Thompson-like group of a so called $d$-ary cloning system. A similar phenomenon occurs for any Röver-Nekrashevych group $V_d(G)$, for $G\le Aut(\mathcal{T}_d)$ a self-similar group. We use this framework to expand on work of Belk and Matucci, who proved that the Röver group, using the Grigorchuk group for $G$, is of type $F_\infty$. Namely, we find some natural conditions on subgroups of $G$ to ensure that $V_d(G)$ is of type $F_\infty$, and in particular we prove…
We work with attracting subshifts generated by substitutions which are also irreducible parageometric automorphisms of free groups. For such a dynamical system, we construct a tree substitution to approximate the repelling real tree of the automorphism. We produce images of this tree inside the Rauzy fractal when the substitution is irreducible Pisot. We describe the contour of this tree and compute an interval exchange transformation of the circle covering the original substitution.
We compute the virtual cohomological dimension (VCD) of the group of partially symmetric outer automorphisms of a free group. We use this to obtain new upper and lower bounds on the VCD of the outer automorphism group of a two-dimensional right-angled Artin group. In the case of a right-angled group with defining graph a tree, the bounds agree.
We study those fully irreducible outer automorphisms phi of a finite rank free group F_r which are ``parageometric'', meaning that the attracting fixed point of phi in the boundary of outer space is a geometric R-tree with respect to the action of F_r, but phi itself is not a geometric outer automorphism in that it is not represented by a homemorphism of a surface. Our main result shows that the expansion factor of phi is strictly larger than the expansion factor of the inverse of phi. As corollaries (proved independently by Guirardel), the inverse of a parageometric outer automorphism is neit…
