We describe a general technique for embedding certain amalgamated products into direct products. This technique provides us with a way of constructing a host of finitely presented subgroups of automatic groups which are not even asynchronously automatic. We can also arrange that such subgroups satisfy, at best, an exponential isoperimetric inequality.
The isoperimeric spectrum consists of all real positive numbers $α$ such that $O(n^α)$ is the Dehn function of a finitely presented group. In this note we show how a recent result of Olshanskii completes the description of the isoperimetric spectrum modulo the celebrated Computer Science conjecture (and one of the seven Millennium Problems) $\mathbf{P=NP}$ and even a formally weaker conjecture.
We present a sharp version of the isoperimetric inequality for finitely generated groups due to T. Couhlon and L. Saloff-Coste based on the proof suggested by M. Gromov.
It is shown that there exist infinitely many non-integers $r>2$ such that the Dehn function of some finitely presented group is $\simeq n^r$. For each positive rational number $s$ we construct pairs of finitely presented groups $H\subset G$ such that the distortion of $H$ in $G$ is $\simeq n^s$. And for each $s\ge 1$ we also construct finitely presented groups whose isodiametric function is $\simeq n^s$.
We prove that the word problem of a finitely generated group $G$ is in NP (solvable in polynomial time by a non-deterministic Turing machine) if and only if this group is a subgroup of a finitely presented group $H$ with polynomial isoperimetric function. The embedding can be chosen in such a way that $G$ has bounded distortion in $H$.
In this thesis we investigate the Dehn functions of two different classes of groups: subdirect products, in particular subdirect products of limit groups; and Bestvina-Brady groups. Let D = Γ_1 \times ... \times Γ_n be a direct product of n \geq 3 finitely presented groups and let H be a subgroup of D. Suppose that each Γ_i contains a finite index subgroup Γ_i' \leq Γ_i such that the commutator subgroup [D', D'] of D' = Γ_1' \times ... \times Γ_n' is contained in H. Suppose furthermore that, for each i, the subgroup Γ_i H has finite index in D. We prove that H is finitely presented and satisfi…
We prove an inequality, valid on any finitely generated group with a fixed finite symmetric generating set, involving the growth of successive balls, and the average length of an element in a ball. It generalizes recent improvements of the Coulhon Saloff-Coste inequality. We reformulate the inequality in terms of the Følner function; in the case the finitely generated group is amenable with exponential growth, this allows us to express the best possible (outer) constant in the Coulhon Saloff-Coste isoperimetric inequality with the help of a formula involving the growth rate and the asymptotic …
We introduce right generating sets, Cayley graphs, growth functions, types and rates, and isoperimetric constants for left homogeneous spaces equipped with coordinate systems; characterise right amenable finitely right generated left homogeneous spaces with finite stabilisers as those whose isoperimetric constant is $0$; and prove that finitely right generated left homogeneous spaces with finite stabilisers of sub-exponential growth are right amenable, in particular, quotient sets of groups of sub-exponential growth by finite subgroups are right amenable.
We construct easy embeddings of relatively free groups (say the free Burnside group, the free solvable group) into finitely presented groups. We introduce a concept of verbal isoperimetric function of a group variety. We prove that if the verbal Dehn function of a relatively free group is bounded by a polynomial then the group can be embedded quasi-isometrically into a finitely presented group with polynomial isoperimetric function. We also construct an easy embedding of any Baumslag-Solitar solvable group into a finitely presented group with polynomial Dehn function.
We prove that every finitely generated nilpotent group of class c admits a polynomial isoperimetric function of degree c+1 and a linear upper bound on its filling length function.
We prove that $n^{7/3}$ is an isoperimetric function for a group of Stallings that is finitely presented but not of type $\mathcal{F}_3$. Note: The authors with Robert Young have now proved a quadratic Dehn function for this group. See arXiv:0712.3877
If F is a finitely generated free group and ϕis an automorphism of F then the mapping torus of ϕadmits a quadratic isoperimetric inequality. This is the third and final paper in a series proving this theorem. The first two were math.GR/0211459 and math.GR/0507589.
We show that there is no uniform polynomial isoperimetric function for finitely presented subgroups of direct products of free groups, by producing a sequence of subgroups $G_r\leq F_2^{(1)} \times \dots \times F_2^{(r)}$ of direct products of 2-generated free groups with Dehn functions bounded below by $n^{r}$. The groups $G_r$ are obtained from the examples of non-coabelian subdirect products of free groups constructed by Bridson, Howie, Miller and Short. As a consequence we obtain that residually free groups do not admit a uniform polynomial isoperimetric function.
We show that arithmetic subgroups of semisimple groups of relative Q-type A_n, B_n, C_n, D_n, E_6, or E_7 have an exponential lower bound to their isoperimetric inequality in the dimension that is 1 less than the real rank of the semisimple group.
This is the first of two papers devoted to connections between asymptotic functions of groups and computational complexity. One of the main results of this paper states that if for every $m$ the first $m$ digits of a real number $α\ge 4$ are computable in time $\le C2^{2^{Cm}}$ for some constant $C>0$ then $n^α$ is equivalent (``big O'') to the Dehn function of a finitely presented group. The smallest isodiametric function of this group is $n^{3/4α}$. On the other hand if $n^α$ is equivalent to the Dehn function of a finitely presented group then the first $m$ digits of $α$ are computable in t…
Let $Γ$ be a finite graph, and for each vertex $i$ let $G_i$ be a finitely presented group. Let $G$ be the graph product of the $G_i$. That is, $G$ is the group obtained from the free product of the $G_i$ by factoring out by the smallest normal subgroup containing all $[g,h]$ where $g\in G_i$ and $h\in G_j$ and there is an edge joining i and j . We show that $G$ has an isoperimetric function of degree $k\ge 2$ (or an exponential isoperimetric function) if each vertex group has such an isoperimetric function.
It is known that in any free group the isolator of finitely generated subgroup is finitely generated subgroup. A very simple proof of this statement is proposed.
We prove that the free product of two finitely presented locally tame groups is locally tame and describe many examples of tame subgroups of finitely presented groups. We also include some open problems related to tame subgroups.
It is proved that all finitely generated subgroups of generalized free product of two groups are finitely separable provided that free factors have this property and amalgamated subgroups are normal in corresponding factors and satisfy the maximum condition for subgroups.
We prove the pro-supersolvable closure of a finitely generated subgroup of the free group is finitely generated. It extends similar results for pro-$p$ closures proved by Ribes-Zalesskii and pro-Nilpotent closures proved by Margolis-Sapir-Weil.
The idea of applying isoperimetric functions to group theory is due to M.Gromov. We introduce the concept of a ``bicombing of narrow shape'' which generalizes the usual notion of bicombing. Our bicombing is related to but different from the combings defined by M. Bridson. If the Cayley graph of a group with respect to a given set of generators admits a bicombing of narrow shape then the group is finitely presented and satisfies a sub-exponential isoperimetric inequality, as well as a polynomial isodiametric inequality. We give an infinite class of examples which are not bicombable in the usual…
In this article we generalize the theory of subgroup graphs of subgroups of free groups to finite index subgroups $H$ of finitely generated groups $G$. We study and prove various properties of $H$ in relation to its subgroup graph $Γ(H)$. For a finitely generated group $G$ we consider the poset $P_{\text{fi}}(G)$ of all right cosets of all proper finite index subgroups of $G$. We use the theory of subgroup graphs to prove that for many finitely generated infinite groups the order complex $ΔP_{\text{fi}} (G)$ and the corresponding nerve complex are contractible.
A subgroup $Δ\leq Γ$ is commensurated if $|Δ:Δ\cap γΔγ^{-1}|<\infty$ for all $γ\in Γ$. We show a finitely generated branch group is just infinite if and only if every commensurated subgroup is either finite or of finite index. As a consequence, every commensurated subgroup of the Grigorchuk group is either finite or finite index.
Given a reflection $r$ in a Coxeter group $W$ (possibly of infinite rank), we consider the subgroup of $W$ generated by the reflections in $W$ having (-1)-eigenvectors orthogonal to the (-1)-eigenvector of $r$. In this paper, we determine completely when this subgroup is finitely generated, by using preceding results on centralizers of reflections. This result provides a new and naturally constructed example of a family of non-finitely generated subgroups of finitely generated groups.
We prove that for arbitrary two finitely generated subgroups A and B having infinite index in a free group F, there is a subgroup H of finite index in B such that the subgroup generated by A and H has infinite index in F. The main corollary of this theorem says that a noncyclic free group of finite rank admits a faithful highly transitive action on an infinite set, whereas the restriction of this action to any finitely generated subgroup of infinite index in F has no infinite orbits.
Brady proved that there are hyperbolic groups with finitely presented subgroups that are not of type $FP_3$ (and hence not hyperbolic). We reprove Brady's theorem by presenting a new construction. Our construction uses Bestvina-Brady Morse theory, but does not involve branched coverings.
We construct new examples of CAT(0) groups containing non finitely presented subgroups that are of type $FP_2$, these CAT(0) groups do not contain copies of $\mathbb{Z}^3$. We also give a construction of groups which are of type $F_n$ but not $F_{n+1}$ with no free abelian subgroups of rank greater than $\lceil\frac{n}{3}\rceil$.
We study the relative growth of finitely generated subgroups in finitely generated groups, and the corresponding distortion function of the embeddings. We explore which functions are equivalent to the relative growth functions and distortion functions of finitely generated subgroups. We also study the connections between these two asymptotic invariants of group embeddings. We give conditions under which a length function on a finitely generated group can be extended to a length function on a larger group.
For all sufficiently large odd integers $n$, the following version of Higman's embedding theorem is proved in the variety ${\cal B}_n$ of all groups satisfying the identity $x^n=1$. A finitely generated group $G$ from ${\cal B}_n$ has a presentation $G=\langle A\mid R\rangle$ with a finite set of generators $A$ and a recursively enumerable set $R$ of defining relations if and only if it is a subgroup of a group $H$ finitely presented in the variety ${\cal B}_n$. It follows that there is a 'universal' $2$-generated finitely presented in ${\cal B}_n$ group containing isomorphic copies of all fin…
This paper studies effective separability for subgroups of finitely generated nilpotent groups and more broadly effective subgroup separability of finitely generated nilpotent groups. We provide upper and lower bounds that are polynomial with respect to the logarithm of the word length for infinite index subgroups of nilpotent groups. In the case of normal subgroups, we provide an exact computation generalizing work of the second author. We introduce a function that quantifies subgroup separability, and we provide polynomial upper and lower bounds. We finish by demonstrating that our results e…
Let G be a connected real Lie group of dimension n. Then there exists a relatively compact open neighbourhood W of e in G such that for n+1 randomly chosen elements g_0,..,g_n the generated subgroup will be dense in G with probability one.
We show that the set of k-dimensional isoperimetric exponents of finitely presented groups is dense in the interval [1, \infty) for k > 1. Hence there is no higher-dimensional analogue of Gromov's gap (1,2) in the isoperimetric spectrum.
For a family of group words $w$ we show that if $G$ is a profinite group in which all $w$-values are contained in a union of finitely many subgroups with a prescribed property, then $w(G)$ has the same property as well. In particular, we show this in the case where the subgroups are periodic or of finite rank. If $G$ contains finitely many subgroups $G_1,G_2,...,G_s$ of finite exponent $e$ whose union contains all $γ_k$-values in $G$, it is shown that $γ_k(G)$ has finite $(e,k,s)$-bounded exponent. If $G$ contains finitely many subgroups $G_1,G_2,...,G_s$ of finite rank $r$ whose union contain…
Let G be a right-angled Artin group. We use geometric methods to compute a presentation of the subgroup H of Aut(G) consisting of the automorphisms that send each generator to a conjugate of itself. This generalizes a result of McCool on basis-conjugating automorphisms of free groups.
We construct the first examples of finitely presented groups with cubic Dehn function containing a finitely generated infinite torsion subgroup. Moreover, we show that any infinite free Burnside group with sufficiently large odd exponent can be embedded as a subgroup of a finitely presented group with cubic Dehn function.
We give new and improved results on the freeness of subgroups of free profinite groups: A subgroup containing the normal closure of a finite word in the elements of a basis is free; Every infinite index subgroup of a finitely generated nonabelian free profinite group is contained in an infinitely generated free profinite subgroup. These results are combined with the twisted wreath product approach of Haran, an observation on the action of compact groups, and a rank counting argument to prove a conjecture of Bary-Soroker, Fehm, and Wiese, thus providing a quite general sufficient condition for …
A classical result of Schreier states that nontrivial finitely generated normal subgroups of free groups are of finite index, that is, free groups can only quotient to finite groups with finitely generated kernel. In this note we extend this result to the class of right-angled Artin groups (RAAGs). More precisely, we prove that the quotient of a RAAG by a finitely generated (full) normal subgroup is abelian-by-finite and finite-by-abelian. As Schreier's result extends to nontrivial free products of groups, we further show that our result extends to graph products of groups. As a corollary, we …
A subgroup Q is commensurated in a group G if each G conjugate of Q intersects Q in a group that has finite index in both Q and the conjugate. So commensurated subgroups are similar to normal subgroups. Semistability and simple connectivity at infinity are geometric asymptotic properties of finitely presented groups. In this paper we generalize several of the classic semistability and simple connectivity at infinity results for finitely presented groups. In particular, we show that if a finitely generated group G contains an infinite finitely generated commensurated subgroup Q of infinite inde…
We generalise the constructions of Brady and Lodha to give infinite families of hyperbolic groups, each having a finitely presented subgroup that is not of type $F_3$. By calculating the Euler characteristic of the hyperbolic groups constructed, we prove that infinitely many of them are pairwise non isomorphic. We further show that the first of these constructions cannot be generalised to dimensions higher than $3$.
We prove a variant of the well-known Reidemeister-Schreier theorem for finitely $L$-presented groups. More precisely, we prove that each finite index subgroup of a finitely $L$-presented group is itself finitely $L$-presented. Our proof is constructive and it yields a finite $L$-presentation for the subgroup. We further study conditions on a finite index subgroup of an invariantly finitely $L$-presented group to be invariantly $L$-presented itself.
In this note we introduce the class of $\mathcal H$-groups (or Hall groups) related to the class of $\mathcal B$-groups defined by Ph. Hall in 1950's. Establishing some basic properties of Hall groups we use them to obtain results concerning embeddings of abelian groups. In particular, we give an explicit classification of all abelian groups that can occur as subgroups in finitely-generated metabelian groups. Hall groups allow to give a negative answer to the Baumslag's conjecture of 1990 on the cardinality of the set of isomorphism classes for abelian subgroups in finitely generated metabelia…
We construct families of $CAT(0)$ groups containing finitely presented groups whose divergence functions are of the form $r^α$ for a dense set of exponents $α\in [2,\infty)$ and $r^q\log(r)$ for integers $q \geq 2$. The same construction also yields examples of $CAT(0)$ groups containing contracting elements which are not contracting in certain finitely presented subgroups.
We will give an example of a branch group $G$ that has exponential growth but does not contain any non-abelian free subgroups. This answers question 16 from \cite{Bartholdi} positively. The proof demonstrates how to construct a non-trivial word $w_{a,b}(x,y)$ for any $a,b \in G$ such that $w_{a,b}(a,b) = 1$. The group $G$ is not just-infinite. We prove that every normal subgroup of $G$ is finitely generated as an abstract group and every proper quotient soluble. Further, $G$ has infinite virtual first Betti number but is not large.
Stallings folding theory is modified, using double coset representatives, and to applied to the study of subgroups of amalgamated products of finite rank free groups. As a first application the subgroup membership problem for such groups is shown to be decidable. An algorithm for this problem is constructed and its complexity is analysed. Groups in this class are also shown to possess the Howson property.
A group G is (finitely) co-Hopfian if it does not contain any proper (finite-index) subgroups isomorphic to itself. We study finitely generated groups G that admit a descending chain of proper normal finite-index subgroups, each of which is isomorphic to G. We prove that up to finite index, these are always obtained by pulling back a chain of subgroups from a free abelian quotient. We give two applications: First, we show any characteristic proper finite-index subgroup isomorphic to G arises by pulling back a finite-index subgroup of the abelianization, and secondly, we prove special cases (fo…
A subgroup $H$ of a group $G$ is $commensurated$ in $G$ if for each $g\in G$, $gHg^{-1}\cap H$ has finite index in both $H$ and $gHg^{-1}$. If there is a sequence of subgroups $H=Q_0\prec Q_1\prec ...\prec Q_{k}\prec Q_{k+1}=G$ where $Q_i$ is commensurated in $Q_{i+1}$ for all $i$, then $Q_0$ is $subcommensurated$ in $G$. In this paper we introduce the notion of the simple connectivity at infinity of a finitely generated group (in analogy with that for finitely presented groups). Our main result is: If a finitely generated group $G$ contains an infinite, finitely generated, subcommensurated su…