Let A and G be finite groups and suppose that A acts via automorphisms on G with $(|A|, |G|)=1$. We study how certain conditions on the Sylow 2-subgroups of the fixed point subgroup of the action $C_G(A)$ may imply the non-simplicity or solubility of G.

The equational complexity function $\beta \nu \,:\,{\open N} \to {\open N}$ of an equational class of algebras bounds the size of equation required to determine the membership of n-element algebras in . Known examples of finitely generated varieties with unbounded equational complexity have growth in Ω(nc), usually for c ≥ (1/2). We show that much slower growth is possible, exhibiting $O(\log_{2}^{3}(n))$ growth among varieties of semilattice-ordered inverse semigroups and additive idempotent semirings. We also examine a quasivariety analogue of equational complexity, and show that a finite group has polylogarithmic quasi-equational complexity function, bounded if and only if all Sylow subgroups are abelian.

We describe completely the link invariants constructed using Markov traces on the Yokonuma–Hecke algebras in terms of the linking matrix and the Hoste–Ocneanu–Millett–Freyd–Lickorish–Yetter–Przytycki–Traczyk (HOMFLY-PT) polynomials of sublinks.

If $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$ is a subgroup property, a group $G$ is said to satisfy the double chain condition on $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$-subgroups if it admits no infinite double sequences

$$\begin{eqnarray}\cdots <X_{-n}<\cdots <X_{-1}<X_{0}<X_{1}<\cdots <X_{n}<\cdots\end{eqnarray}$$

$\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$

For a prime $p$, let $\hat{F}_{p}$ be a finitely generated free pro-$p$-group of rank at least $2$. We show that the second discrete homology group $H_{2}(\hat{F}_{p},\mathbb{Z}/p)$ is an uncountable $\mathbb{Z}/p$-vector space. This answers a problem of A. K. Bousfield.

Sequential order statistics can be used to describe the ordered lifetimes of components of a system when the failure of a component may affect the reliability of the remaining components. After a reliability system consisting of n components fails, some of its components may still be alive. In this paper we first establish some univariate stochastic orderings and ageing properties of the residual lifetimes of the live components in a sequential (n-r+1)-out-of-n system. We also obtain a characterizing result for the exponential distribution based on uncorrelated residual lifetimes of live components. Finally, we provide some sufficient conditions for comparing vectors of residual lifetimes of the live components from two sequential (n-r+1)-out-of-n systems. The results established here extend some well-known results in the literature.

Let $T$ be a finite simple group of Lie type in characteristic $p$, and let $S$ be a Sylow subgroup of $T$ with maximal order. It is well known that $S$ is a Sylow $p$-subgroup except for an explicit list of exceptions and that $S$ is always ‘large’ in the sense that $|T|^{1/3}<|S|\leq |T|^{1/2}$. One might anticipate that, moreover, the Sylow $r$-subgroups of $T$ with $r\neq p$ are usually significantly smaller than $S$. We verify this hypothesis by proving that, for every $T$ and every prime divisor $r$ of $|T|$ with $r\neq p$, the order of the Sylow $r$-subgroup of $T$ is at most $|T|^{2\lfloor \log _{r}(4(\ell +1)r)\rfloor /\ell }=|T|^{O(\log _{r}(\ell )/\ell )}$, where $\ell$ is the Lie rank of $T$.

A subgroup $H$ is called a weak second maximal subgroup of $G$ if $H$ is a maximal subgroup of a maximal subgroup of $G$. Let $m(G,H)$ denote the number of maximal subgroups of $G$ containing $H$. We prove that $m(G,H)-1$ divides the index of some maximal subgroup of $G$ when $H$ is a weak second maximal subgroup of $G$. This partially answers a question of Flavell [‘Overgroups of second maximal subgroups’, Arch. Math.64(4) (1995), 277–282] and extends a result of Pálfy and Pudlák [‘Congruence lattices of finite algebras and intervals in subgroup lattices of finite groups’, Algebra Universalis11(1) (1980), 22–27].

We consider the relationship between structural information of a finite group $G$ and $\text{cd}_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}}(G)$, the set of all irreducible projective character degrees of $G$ with factor set $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}$. We show that for nontrivial $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}$, if all numbers in $\text{cd}_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}}(G)$ are prime powers, then $G$ is solvable. Our result is proved by classical character theory using the bijection between irreducible projective representations and irreducible constituents of induced representations in its representation group.

Wreath products of nondiscrete locally compact groups are usually not locally compact groups, nor even topological groups. As a substitute introduce a natural extension of the wreath product construction to the setting of locally compact groups. Applying this construction, we disprove a conjecture of Trofimov, constructing compactly generated locally compact groups of intermediate growth without any open compact normal subgroup.

Let ℍ be the division ring of real quaternions. Let SL(2, ℍ) be the group of 2 × 2 quaternionic matrices $A={\scriptsize{(\begin{array}{l@{\quad}l} a & b \\ c & d \end{array})}}$ with quaternionic determinant det A = |ad − aca−1b| = 1. This group acts by the orientation-preserving isometries of the five-dimensional real hyperbolic space. We obtain discreteness criteria for Zariski-dense subgroups of SL(2, ℍ).

Let $T$ be a locally finite tree without vertices of degree $1$. We show that among the closed subgroups of $\text{Aut}(T)$ acting with a bounded number of orbits, the Chabauty-closure of the set of topologically simple groups is the set of groups without proper open subgroup of finite index. Moreover, if all vertices of $T$ have degree ${\geqslant}3$, then the set of isomorphism classes of topologically simple closed subgroups of $\text{Aut}(T)$ acting doubly transitively on $\unicode[STIX]{x2202}T$ carries a natural compact Hausdorff topology inherited from Chabauty. Some of our considerations are valid in the context of automorphism groups of locally finite connected graphs. Applications to Weyl-transitive automorphism groups of buildings are also presented.

Given a locally finite leafless tree $T$, various algebraic groups over local fields might appear as closed subgroups of $\operatorname{Aut}(T)$. We show that the set of closed cocompact subgroups of $\operatorname{Aut}(T)$ that are isomorphic to a quasi-split simple algebraic group is a closed subset of the Chabauty space of $\operatorname{Aut}(T)$. This is done via a study of the integral Bruhat–Tits model of $\operatorname{SL}_{2}$ and $\operatorname{SU}_{3}^{L/K}$, that we carry on over arbitrary local fields, without any restriction on the (residue) characteristic. In particular, we show that in residue characteristic $2$, the Tits index of simple algebraic subgroups of $\operatorname{Aut}(T)$ is not always preserved under Chabauty limits.

The first author [J. Brough, ‘On vanishing criteria that control finite group structure’, J. Algebra458 (2016), 207–215] has shown that for certain arithmetical results on conjugacy class sizes it is enough to consider only the vanishing conjugacy class sizes. In this paper we further weaken the conditions to consider only vanishing elements of prime power order.

For a finite group $G$ , denote by $\unicode[STIX]{x1D707}(G)$ the degree of a minimal permutation representation of $G$ . We call $G$ exceptional if there is a normal subgroup $N\unlhd G$ with $\unicode[STIX]{x1D707}(G/N)>\unicode[STIX]{x1D707}(G)$ . To complete the work of Easdown and Praeger [‘On minimalfaithful permutation representations of finite groups’, Bull. Aust. Math. Soc.38(2) (1988), 207–220], for all primes $p\geq 3$ , we describe an exceptional group of order $p^{5}$ and prove that no exceptional group of order $p^{4}$ exists.

Classical finite association schemes lead to finite-dimensional algebras which are generated by finitely many stochastic matrices. Moreover, there exist associated finite hypergroups. The notion of classical discrete association schemes can be easily extended to the possibly infinite case. Moreover, this notion can be relaxed slightly by using suitably deformed families of stochastic matrices by skipping the integrality conditions. This leads to a larger class of examples which are again associated with discrete hypergroups. In this paper we propose a topological generalization of association schemes by using a locally compact basis space $X$ and a family of Markov-kernels on $X$ indexed by some locally compact space $D$ where the supports of the associated probability measures satisfy some partition property. These objects, called continuous association schemes, will be related to hypergroup structures on $D$. We study some basic results for this notion and present several classes of examples. It turns out that, for a given commutative hypergroup, the existence of a related continuous association scheme implies that the hypergroup has many features of a double coset hypergroup. We, in particular, show that commutative hypergroups, which are associated with commutative continuous association schemes, carry dual positive product formulas for the characters. On the other hand, we prove some rigidity results in particular in the compact case which say that for given spaces $X,D$ there are only a few continuous association schemes.

A canonical basis in the sense of Lusztig is a basis of a free module over a ring of Laurent polynomials that is invariant under a certain semilinear involution and is obtained from a fixed “standard basis” through a triangular base change matrix with polynomial entries whose constant terms equal the identity matrix. Among the better known examples of canonical bases are the Kazhdan–Lusztig basis of Iwahori–Hecke algebras (see Kazhdan and Lusztig, Representations of Coxeter groups and Hecke algebras, Invent. Math. 53 (1979), 165–184), Lusztig’s canonical basis of quantum groups (see Lusztig, Canonical bases arising from quantized enveloping algebras, J. Amer. Math. Soc. 3(2) (1990), 447–498) and the Howlett–Yin basis of induced $W$-graph modules (see Howlett and Yin, Inducing W-graphs I, Math. Z. 244(2) (2003), 415–431; Inducing W-graphs II, Manuscripta Math. 115(4) (2004), 495–511). This paper has two major theoretical goals: first to show that having bases is superfluous in the sense that canonicalization can be generalized to nonfree modules. This construction is functorial in the appropriate sense. The second goal is to show that Howlett–Yin induction of $W$-graphs is well-behaved a functor between module categories of $W$-graph algebras that satisfies various properties one hopes for when a functor is called “induction,” for example transitivity and a Mackey theorem.

Let $G$ be an orthogonal, symplectic or unitary group over a non-archimedean local field of odd residual characteristic. This paper concerns the study of the “wild part” of an irreducible smooth representation of $G$, encoded in its “semisimple character”. We prove two fundamental results concerning them, which are crucial steps toward a complete classification of the cuspidal representations of $G$. First we introduce a geometric combinatorial condition under which we prove an “intertwining implies conjugacy” theorem for semisimple characters, both in $G$ and in the ambient general linear group. Second, we prove a Skolem–Noether theorem for the action of $G$ on its Lie algebra; more precisely, two semisimple elements of the Lie algebra of $G$ which have the same characteristic polynomial must be conjugate under an element of $G$ if there are corresponding semisimple strata which are intertwined by an element of $G$.

The genus spectrum of a finite group G is the set of all g such that G acts faithfully on a compact Riemann surface of genus g. It is an open problem to find a general description of the genus spectrum of the groups in interesting classes, such as the Abelian p-groups. Motivated by earlier work of Talu for odd primes, we develop a general combinatorial method, for arbitrary primes, to obtain a structured description of the so-called reduced genus spectrum of Abelian p-groups, including the reduced minimum genus. In particular, we determine the complete genus spectrum for a large subclass, namely, those having ‘large’ defining invariants. With our method we construct infinitely many counterexamples to a conjecture of Talu, which states that an Abelian p-group is recoverable from its genus spectrum. Finally, we give a series of examples of our method, in the course of which we prove, for example, that almost all elementary Abelian p-groups are uniquely determined by their minimum genus, and that almost all Abelian p-groups of exponent p2 are uniquely determined by their minimum genus and Kulkarni invariant.

For an orientable surface S of finite topological type with genus g ≥ 3, we construct a finite set of curves whose union of iterated rigid expansions is the curve graph $\mathcal{C}$(S). The set constructed, and the method of rigid expansion, are closely related to Aramayona and Leiniger's finite rigid set in Aramayona and Leininger, J. Topology Anal.5(2) (2013), 183–203 and Aramayona and Leininger, Pac. J. Math.282(2) (2016), 257–283, and in fact a consequence of our proof is that Aramayona and Leininger's set also exhausts the curve graph via rigid expansions.