Canonical Semigroups of States and Cocycles for the Group of Automorphisms of a Homogeneous Tree

Let G=A ut(T) be the group of automorphisms of a homogeneous tree and let d(v,gv) denote the natural tree distance. Fix a base vertex e in T. The function (g)=exp(–d(e,ge)), being positive definte on G, gives rise to a semigroup of states on G whose infinitesimal generator d/d|₌₀=log() is conditionally positive definite but not positive definite. Hence, log() corresponds to a nontrivial cocycle (g): GH in some representation space H . In contrast with the case of PGL(2,), the representation is not irreducible.Let _o (g) be the derivative of the spherical function corresponding to the complementary series of A ut(T). We show that –d(e,ge) and _o (g) come from cohomologous cocycles. Moreover, _o is associated to one of the two (irreducible) special representations of A ut(T).