Nilpotency of Bocksteins, Kropholler's hierarchy and a conjecture of Moore

We show that the class of pairs (Γ,H) of a group and a finite index subgroup which verify a conjecture of Moore about projectivity of modules over ZΓ satisfy certain closure properties. We use this, together with a result of Benson and Goodearl, in order to prove that Moore's conjecture is valid for groups which belongs to Kropholler's hierarchy LHF. For finite groups, Moore's conjecture is a consequence of a theorem of Serre, about the vanishing of a certain product in the cohomology ring (the Bockstein elements). Using our result, we construct examples of pairs (Γ,H) which satisfy the conjecture without satisfying the analog of Serre's theorem.     

Traces of Torsion Units

A conjecture due to Zassenhaus asserts that if G is a finite group then any torsion unit in ?G is conjugate in ?G to an element of G. Here, a weaker form of this conjecture is proved for some infinite groups.     

Zassenhaus Conjecture (ZC1) on torsion units of integral group rings for some metabelian groups

We prove a conjecture of Zassenhaus that every normalized torsion unit of the integral group ring ZG of a finite group G is rationally conjugate to a group element for some metabelian groups including metacyclic groups G containing a normal cyclic group A such that G/A is cyclic of prime power order. The relative prime case was done in [11]. Received: 21 April 2005     

Groups with anti-symmetric mappings

Conclusion The above theorems are sufficient to demonstrate the existence of antisymmetric mappings for all non-Abelian group of order less than 36, except for the group <a, b\a ³ =b ⁸ =e, ab =ba ²> of order 24, and this group can be shown to have one. On the basis of our results, and the fact that we have no conditions on a non-Abelian group that would eliminate any from having anti-symmetric mappings, we conjecture that allnon-Abelian groups have anti-symmetric mappings.     

Towards the Eaton-Moretó conjecture on the minimal height of characters

Abstract

In this note we prove that the Eaton-Moretó conjecture holds for all blocks of finite general linear and unitary groups for all primes. Also, we show that no block of a finite quasi-simple group of classical Lie type provides a minimal counterexample to the conjecture, and so for ? > 5 no ?-block of any quasi-simple group can be a minimal counterexample.     

Hamiltonian decomposition of Cayley graphs of ordersp 2 andpq

In this paper, it is proved that any connected Cayley graph on an abelian group of order pq orp ² has a hamiltonian decomposition, wherep andq are odd primes. This result answers partially a conjecture of Alspach concerning hamiltonian decomposition of 2k-regular connected Cayley graphs on abelian groups.     

The power graph of a finite group

The power graph of a group is the graph whose vertex set is the group, two elements being adjacent if one is a power of the other. We observe that non-isomorphic finite groups may have isomorphic power graphs, but that finite abelian groups with isomorphic power graphs must be isomorphic. We conjecture that two finite groups with isomorphic power graphs have the same number of elements of each order. We also show that the only finite group whose automorphism group is the same as that of its power graph is the Klein group of order 4.     

FINITELY GENERATED G′ AND POSITIVE LAWS

We conjecture that a finitely generated relatively free group G has a finitely generated commutator subgroup G′ if and only if G satisfies a positive law. We confirm this conjecture for groups G in the large class, containing all residually finite and all soluble groups.     

A Characterization of <Emphasis Type="Italic">PSU</Emphasis><Subscript>3</Subscript>(<Emphasis Type="Italic">q</Emphasis>) for <Emphasis Type="Italic">q</Emphasis> ≥ 5

Based on the prime graph of a finite simple group, its order is the product of its order components (see [4]). We prove that the simple groups PSU₃(q) are uniquely determined by their order components. Our result immediately implies that the Thompsons conjecture and the Wujie Shis conjecture [16] are valid for these groups.AMS Subject Classification: 20D05, 20D60     

A characterization of PSL(3,q) where q is an odd prime power

Order components of a finite group are introduced in Chen (J. Algebra 15 (1996) 184). We prove that PSL(3,q) can be uniquely determined by its order components where q is an odd prime power. A main consequence of our result is the validity of Thompson's conjecture for the groups under consideration.     

Integrality of L2L^2-Betti numbers

The Atiyah conjecture predicts that the -Betti numbers of a finite CW-complex with torsion-free fundamental group are integers. We establish the Atiyah conjecture, under the condition that it holds for G and that is a normal subgroup, for amalgamated free products . Here F is a free group and is an arbitrary semi-direct product. This includes free products G*F and semi-direct products . We also show that the Atiyah conjecture holds (with an additional technical condition) for direct and inverse limits of groups for which it is true. As a corollary it holds for positive 1-relator groups with torsion free abelianization. Putting everything together we establish a new (bigger) class of groups for which the Atiyah conjecture holds, which contains all free groups and in particular is closed under taking subgroups, direct sums, free products, extensions with torsion-free elementary amenable quotient or with free quotient, and under certain direct and inverse limits. Received: 22 August 1998/ Revised: 10 Jannary 2000 / Published online: 28 June 2000     

Integral Group Ring of the Mathieu Simple Group M 23

We investigate the classical Zassenhaus conjecture for the unit group of the integral group ring of Mathieu simple group M ₂₃ using the Luthar–Passi method. This work is a continuation of the research that we carried out for Mathieu groups M ₁₁ and M ₁₂. As a consequence, for this group we confirm Kimmerle's conjecture on prime graphs.     

An etale approach to the Novikov conjecture

We show that the rational Novikov conjecture for a group Γ of finite homological type follows from the mod 2 acyclicity of the Higson compactification of an EΓ. We then show that for groups of finite asymptotic dimension, the Higson compactification is mod p acyclic for all p and deduce the integral Novikov conjecture for these groups. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

OnL 2-homology and asphericity

We useL ² methods to show that if a group with a presentation of deficiency one is an extension ofZ by a finitely generated normal subgroup then the 2-complex corresponding to any presentation of optimal deficiency is aspherical and to prove a converse of the Cheeger-Gromov-Gottlieb theorem relating Euler characteristic and asphericity. These results are applied to the Whitehead conjecture, 4-manifolds and 2-knot groups.     

A reduction theorem for the McKay conjecture

The McKay conjecture asserts that for every finite group G and every prime p, the number of irreducible characters of G having p’-degree is equal to the number of such characters of the normalizer of a Sylow p-subgroup of G. Although this has been confirmed for large numbers of groups, including, for example, all solvable groups and all symmetric groups, no general proof has yet been found. In this paper, we reduce the McKay conjecture to a question about simple groups. We give a list of conditions that we hope all simple groups will satisfy, and we show that the McKay conjecture will hold for a finite group G if every simple group involved in G satisfies these conditions. Also, we establish that our conditions are satisfied for the simple groups PSL₂(q) for all prime powers q≥4, and for the Suzuki groups Sz(q) and Ree groups R(q), where q=2 ^e or q=3 ^e respectively, and e>1 is odd. Since our conditions are also satisfied by the sporadic simple group J ₁, it follows that the McKay conjecture holds (for all primes p) for every finite group having an abelian Sylow 2-subgroup.     

Uniform Boundedness of Torsion Subgroups of Linear Groups

The torsion conjecture says： for any abelian variety A defined over a number field k, the order of the torsion subgroup of A（k） is bounded by a constant C（k,d） which depends only on the number field k and the dimension d of the abelian variety. The torsion conjecture remains open in general. However, in this paper, a short argument shows that the conjecture is true for more general fields if we consider linear groups instead of abelian varieties. If G is a connected linear algebraic group defined over a field k which is finitely generated over Q,Г is a torsion subgroup of G（k）. Then the order of Г is bounded by a constant C＇（k, d） which depends only on k and the dimension d of G.     

Dimension and automorphism groups of lattices

Every group is the automorphism group of a lattice of order dimension at most 4. We conjecture that the automorphism groups of finite modular lattices of bounded dimension do not represent every finite group. It is shown that ifp is a large prime dividing the order of the automorphism group of a finite modular latticeL then eitherL has high order dimension orM _p, the lattice of height 2 and orderp+2, has a cover-preserving embedding inL. We mention a number of open problems. Presented by C. R. Platt.     

On growth,recurrence and the Choquet-Deny Theorem for <Emphasis Type="Italic">p</Emphasis>-adic Lie groups

We first study the growth properties of p-adic Lie groups and its connection with p-adic Lie groups of type R and prove that a non-type R p-adic Lie group has compact neighbourhoods of identity having exponential growth. This is applied to prove the growth dichotomy for a large class of p-adic Lie groups which includes p-adic algebraic groups. We next study p-adic Lie groups that admit recurrent random walks and prove the natural growth conjecture connecting growth and the existence of recurrent random walks, precisely we show that a p-adic Lie group admits a recurrent random walk if and only if it has polynomial growth of degree at most two. We prove this conjecture for some other classes of groups also. We also prove the Choquet-Deny Theorem for compactly generated p-adic Lie groups of polynomial growth and also show that polynomial growth is necessary and sufficient for the validity of the Choquet-Deny for all spread-out probabilities on Zariski-connected p-adic algebraic groups. Counter example is also given to show that certain assumptions made in the main results can not be relaxed.     

Trivial source modules in blocks with cyclic defect groups

We shall present a method to get trivial source modules easily just by looking at values of ordinary characters at non-identity p-elements in finite groups instead of doing huge calculation. The method is only for a case where defect groups are cyclic. Nevertheless, it works well at least when we want to prove Broué’s abelian defect group conjecture for blocks which have elementary abelian defect groups of order p ².     

Subgroups of Free Groups: a Contribution to the Hanna Neumann Conjecture

We prove that the strengthened Hanna Neumann conjecture, on the rank of the inter-section of finitely generated subgroups of a free group, holds for a large class of groups characterized by geometric properties. One particular case of our result implies that the conjecture holds for all positively finitely generated subgroups of the free group F(A) (over the basis A), that is, for subgroups which admit a finite set of generators taken in the free monoid over A.