In this paper, we consider the group Aut$(\mathbb{Q}, \leq)$ of order-automorphisms of the rational numbers, proving a result analogous to a theorem of Galvin's for the symmetric group. In an announcement, Khélif states that every countable subset of Aut$(\mathbb{Q}, \leq)$ is contained in an $N$-generated subgroup of Aut$(\mathbb{Q}, \leq)$ for some fixed $N\in\mathbb{N}$. We show that the least such $N$ is $2$. Moreover, for every countable subset of Aut$(\mathbb{Q}, \leq)$, we show that every element can be given as a prescribed product of two generators without using their inverses. More precisely, suppose that $a$ and $b$ freely generate the free semigroup $\{a,b\}^+$ consisting of the non-empty words over $a$ and $b$. Then we show that there exists a sequence of words $w_1, w_2,\ldots$ over $\{a,b\}$ such that for every sequence $f_1, f_2, \ldots\in\,$Aut$(\mathbb{Q}, \leq)$ there is a homomorphism $ϕ:\{a,b\}^{+}\to$ Aut$(\mathbb{Q},\leq)$ where $(w_i)ϕ=f_i$ for every $i$.
As a corollary to the main theorem in this paper, we obtain a result of Droste and Holland showing that the strong cofinality of Aut$(\mathbb{Q}, \leq)$ is uncountable, or equivalently that Aut$(\mathbb{Q}, \leq)$ has uncountable cofinality and Bergman's property.
Let F_n be the free group of rank n, with generating set S=\{x_1,...,x_n\}. An automorphism ϕof F_n is called symmetric if for each 1\leq i\leq n, ϕ(x_i) is conjugate to x_j or x_j^{-1} for some 1\leq j\leq n. Let ΣAut(F_n) be the group of symmetric automorphisms. We prove that the inclusion ΣAut(F_n) \rightarrow ΣAut(F_{n+1}) induces an isomorphism in rational homology for n>(3i-1)/2.
For a classical group $G$ of type $\mathsf D_n$ over a field $k$ of characteristic different from $2$, we show the existence of a finitely generated regular extension $R$ of $k$ such that $G$ admits outer automorphisms over $R$. Using this result and a construction of groups of type $\mathsf A$ from groups of type $\mathsf D$, we construct new examples of groups of type $^2\mathsf A_n$ with $n\equiv 3\bmod 4$ and the first examples of type $^2\mathsf A_n$ with $n\equiv 1\bmod 4$ $(n\geq 5)$ that are not $R$-trivial, hence not rational (nor stably rational).
An automorphism of a graph product of groups is conjugating if it sends each factor to a conjugate of a factor (possibly different). In this article, we determine precisely when the group of conjugating automorphisms of a graph product satisfies Kazhdan's property (T) and when it satisfies some vastness properties including SQ-universality.
Let F_{n+m} be the free group of rank n+m, with generators x_1,...,x_{n+m}. An automorphism ϕof F_{n+m} is called partially symmetric if for each 1 \le i \le m, ϕ(x_i) is conjugate to x_j or x_j^{-1} for some 1 \le j \le m. Let Σ\Aut_n^m be the group of partially symmetric automorphisms. We prove that for any m \ge 0 the inclusion Σ\Aut_n^m \to Σ\Aut_{n+1}^m induces an isomorphism in rational homology for dimensions i satisfying n \ge (3(i+1)+m)/2, with a similar statement for the groups PΣ\Aut_n^m of pure partially symmetric automorphisms. We also prove that for any n \ge 0 the inclusion Σ\Au…
We prove that the Reidemeister zeta functions of automorphisms of crystallographic groups with diagonal holonomy $\mathbb{Z}_2$ are rational. As a result, we obtain that Reidemeister zeta functions of automorphisms of almost-crystallographic groups up to dimension 3 are rational.
In this note, we prove that if every character of a finite group $G$ fixed by an order-2 Galois automorphism has odd degree, then $G$ has a normal Sylow $2$-subgroup. On the way, we study extensions of characters of $GL_n(q)$, $q$ odd, to the group extended by the transpose-inverse automorphism and prove that unipotent characters of $PSL_n(q)$ extend to rational characters of its automorphism group.
An n-dimensional quantum torus is a twisted group algebra of the group $\Z^n$. It is called rational if all invertible commutators are roots of unity. In the present note we describe a normal form for rational n-dimensional quantum tori over any field. Moreover, we show that for $n = 2$ the natural exact sequence describing the automorphism group of the quantum torus splits over any field.
We study fixed point properties of the automorphism group of the universal Coxeter group Aut$(W_n)$. In particular, we prove that whenever Aut$(W_n)$ acts by isometries on complete $d$-dimensional CAT$(0)$ space with $d<\lfloor\frac{n}{2}\rfloor$, then it must fix a point. We also prove that Aut$(W_n)$ does not have Kazhdan's property (T). Further, strong restrictions are obtained on homomorphisms of Aut$(W_n)$ to groups that do not contain a copy of Sym(n).
We classify rational surfaces for which the image of the automorphisms group in the group of linear transformations of the Picard group is the largest possible. This answers a question raised by Arthur Coble in 1928, and can be rephrased in terms of periodic orbits of a birational action of an infinite Coxeter group on ordered point sets in the projective plane modulo projective equivalence. We also outline the classification of non-rational surfaces with large automorphism groups.
We compute the homology groups $H_*(\operatorname{Out}(F_7);\mathbb Q)$ of the outer automorphism group of the free group of rank $7$. We produce in this manner the first rational homology classes of $\operatorname{Out}(F_n)$ that are neither constant ($*=0$) nor Morita classes ($*=2n-4$).
We investigate the structure of the monoid of endomorphisms of the ordered set $(\mathbb{Q},{\leq})$ of rational numbers. We show that for any countable linearly ordered set $Ω$, there are uncountably many maximal subgroups of $\operatorname{End}(\mathbb{Q},{\leq})$ isomorphic to the automorphism group of $Ω$. We characterise those subsets $X$ of $\mathbb{Q}$ that arise as a retract in $(\mathbb{Q},{\leq})$ in terms of topological information concerning $X$. Finally, we establish that a countable group arises as the automorphism group of a countable linearly ordered set, and hence as a maximal…
We prove that the automorphism group of a Fraïssé structure M equipped with a notion of stationary independence is universal for the class of automorphism groups of substructures of M. Furthermore, we show that this applies to certain homogeneous n-gons.
It is not known whether or not the stable rational cohomology groups $\tilde H^*(Aut(F_\infty);\Q)$ always vanish. We show that either the rational cohomology does not vanish in certain dimensions, or the integral cohomology of a moduli space of pointed graphs does not stabilize in certain other dimensions. Similar results are stated for groups of outer automorphisms. This yields that $H^5(\hat Q_m; \mathbb{Z})$, $H^6(\hat Q_m; \mathbb{Z})$, and $H^5(Q_m; \mathbb{Z})$ never stabilize as $m \to \infty$, where the moduli spaces $\hat Q_m$ and $Q_m$ are the quotients of the spines $\hat X_m$ and …
In this paper, we study group equations with occurrences of automorphisms. We describe equational domains in this class of equations. Moreover, we solve a number of open problem posed in universal algebraic geometry.
We prove that the automorphism group of the Urysohn diversity is a universal Polish group. Furthermore we show that the automorphism group of the rational Urysohn diversity has ample generics, a dense conjugacy class and that it embeds densely into the automorphism group of the (full) Urysohn diversity. It follows that this latter group also has a dense conjugacy class.
We show that the automorphism group of Philip Hall's universal locally finite group has ample generics,that is, it admits comeager diagonal conjugacy classes in all dimensions.Consequently, it has the small index property, is not the union of a countable chain of non-open subgroups, and has the automatic continuity property. Also, we discuss some algebraic and topological properties of the automorphism group of Hall universal group. For example, we show that every generic automorphism of Hall universal group is conjugate to all of its powers, and hence has roots of all orders.
We classify homomorphisms of the Baumslag-Gersten group into itself. We prove it is Hopfian and co-Hopfian. We show that the group of outer automorphisms of the Baumslag-Gersten group is isomorphic to the dyadic rationals with the addition operation. These results are not new. They were obtained by Andrew M. Brunner in \cite{Brunner}. However, our exposition is self-contained and, hopefully, more accessible for some readers.
We present three examples of countable homogeneous structures (also called Fraisse limits) whose automorphism groups are not universal, namely, fail to contain isomorphic copies of all automorphism groups of their substructures. Our first example is a particular case of a rather general construction on Fraisse classes, which we call diversification, leading to automorphism groups containing copies of all finite groups. Our second example is a special case of another general construction on Fraisse classes, the mixed sums, leading to a Fraisse class with all finite symmetric groups appearing as…
We investigate the combinatorial and geometric properties of automorphism groups of universal right-angled Coxeter groups, which are the automorphism groups of free products of copies of Z_2. It is currently an open question as to whether or not these automorphism groups have non-positive curvature. Analogous to Outer Space as a model for Out(F_n), we prove that the natural combinatorial and topological model for their outer automorphism groups can \emph{not} be given an equivariant CAT(0) metric. This is particularly interesting as there are very few non-trivial examples of proving that a mod…
This paper studies the rigidity properties of the abstract commensurator of the outer automorphism group of a universal Coxeter group of rank $n$, which is the free product $W_n$ of $n$ copies of $\mathbb{Z}/2\mathbb{Z}$. We prove that for $n\geq 5$ the natural map $\mathrm{Out}(W_n) \to \mathrm{Comm}(\mathrm{Out}(W_n))$ is an isomorphism and that every isomorphism between finite index subgroups of $\mathrm{Out}(W_n)$ is given by a conjugation by an element of $\mathrm{Out}(W_n)$.
We compute the rational stable homology of the automorphism groups of free nilpotent groups. These groups interpolate between the general linear groups over the ring of integers and the automorphism groups of free groups, and we employ functor homology to reduce to the abelian case. As an application, we also compute the rational stable homology of the outer automorphism groups and of the mapping class groups of the associated aspherical nil-manifolds in the TOP, PL, and DIFF categories.
We improve a result of Prokhorov and Shramov on the rank of finite $p$-subgroups of the birational automorphism group of a rationally connected variety. Known examples show that they are sharp in many cases.
In 1993, Muzychuk \cite{muzychuk} showed that the rational Schur rings over a cyclic group $Z_n$ are in one-to-one correspondence with sublattices of the divisor lattice of $n$, or equivalently, with sublattices of the lattice of subgroups of $Z_n$. This can easily be extended to show that for any finite group $G$, sublattices of the lattice of characteristic subgroups of $G$ give rise to rational Schur rings over $G$ in a natural way. Our main result is that any finite group may be represented as the (algebraic) automorphism group of such a rational Schur ring over an abelian $p$-group, for a…
In \cite{MbPe}, Mbombo and Pestov prove that the group of isometries of the generalized Urysohn space of density $κ$, for uncountable $κ$ such that $κ^{<κ}=κ$, is not a universal topological group of weight $κ$. We investigate automorphism groups of other uncountable ultrahomogeneous structures and prove that they are rarely universal topological groups for the corresponding classes. Our list of uncountable ultrahomogeneous structures includes random uncountable graph, tournament, linear order, partial order, group. That is in contrast with similar results obtained for automorphism groups of c…
Let $P(\mathrm{sl}_2(K))$ be the Poisson enveloping algebra of the Lie algebra $\mathrm{sl}_2(K)$ over an algebraically closed field $K$ of characteristic zero. The quotient algebras $ $ $P(\mathrm{sl}_2(K))/(C_P-λ)$, where $C_P$ is the standard Casimir element of $\mathrm{sl}_2(K)$ in $P(\mathrm{sl}_2(K))$ and $0\neq λ\in K$, are proven to be simple in \cite{UZh}. Using a result by L. Makar-Limanov \cite{ML90}, we describe generators of the automorphism group of $P(\mathrm{sl}_2(K))/(C_P-λ)$ and represent this group as an amalgamated product of its subgroups. Moreover, using similar results b…
We apply results proved in [Li19] to the linear order expansions of non-trivial free homogeneous structures and the universal n-linear order for $n\geq 2$, and prove the simplicity of their automorphism groups.
We say that a group $G$ has Bergman's property (the property of universality of finite width) if for every generating set $X$ of $G$ with $X=X^{-1}$ we have that $G=X^k$ for some natural number $k.$ The property is named after George Bergman who have proved recently that the infinite symmetric groups are groups of universally finite width. The first example of an infinite group with Bergman's property is due to Shelah (1980s). Lately some other examples have been found: the automorphism groups of doubly transitive chains (Droste-Holland), the automorphism group of reals as a Borel space (Drost…
Homology of the group Aut(F_n) of automorphisms of a free group on n generators is known to be independent of n in a certain stable range. Using tools from homotopy theory, we prove that in this range it agrees with homology of symmetric groups. In particular, Aut(F_n) has no stable rational homology, settling a conjecture of Hatcher and Vogtmann.
An adjoint Chevalley group of rank at least 2 over a rational algebra (or a similar ring), its elementary subgroup, and the corresponding Lie ring have the same automorphism group. These automorphisms are explicitly described.
We establish links between countable algebraically closed graphs and the endomorphisms of the countable universal graph $R$. As a consequence we show that, for any countable graph $Γ$, there are uncountably many maximal subgroups of the endomorphism monoid of $R$ isomorphic to the automorphism group of $Γ$. Further structural information about End $R$ is established including that Aut $Γ$ arises in uncountably many ways as a Schützenberger group. Similar results are proved for the countable universal directed graph and the countable universal bipartite graph.
