For odd n we construct a path $\rho\;:\;\thinspace \Pi_1(S) \to SL(n\mathbb{R})$ of discrete, faithful, and Zariski dense representations of a surface group such that $\rho_t(\Pi_1(S)) \subset SL(n,\mathbb{Q})$ for every $t\in \mathbb{Q}$.

The aim of this paper is to study supersoluble skew braces, a class of skew braces that encompasses all finite skew braces of square-free order. It turns out that finite supersoluble skew braces have Sylow towers and that in an arbitrary supersoluble skew brace B many relevant skew brace-theoretical properties are easier to identify: For example, a centrally nilpotent ideal of B is B-centrally nilpotent, a fact that simplifies the computational search for the Fitting ideal; also, B has finite multipermutational level if and only if $(B,+)$ is nilpotent.

Given a finite presentation of the structure skew brace $G(X,r)$ associated with a finite nondegenerate solution of the Yang–Baxter equation (YBE), there is an algorithm that decides if $G(X,r)$ is supersoluble or not. Moreover, supersoluble skew braces are examples of almost polycyclic skew braces, so they give rise to solutions of the YBE on which one can algorithmically work on.

In this note, we present examples of non-quasi-geodesic metric spaces which are hyperbolic (i.e., satisfying Gromov’s $4$-point condition) while the intersection of any two metric balls therein does not either ‘look like’ a ball or has uniformly bounded eccentricity. This answers an open question posed by Chatterji and Niblo.

We prove that, for any countable acylindrically hyperbolic group G, there exists a generating set S of G such that the corresponding Cayley graph $\Gamma (G,S)$ is hyperbolic, $|\partial \Gamma (G,S)|>2$, the natural action of G on $\Gamma (G,S)$ is acylindrical and the natural action of G on the Gromov boundary $\partial \Gamma (G,S)$ is hyperfinite. This result broadens the class of groups that admit a non-elementary acylindrical action on a hyperbolic space with a hyperfinite boundary action.

Using Patterson–Sullivan measures, we investigate growth problems for groups acting on a metric space with a strongly contracting element.

The complete classification of the finite simple groups that are $(2,3)$-generated is a problem which is still open only for orthogonal groups. Here, we construct $(2, 3)$-generators for the finite odd-dimensional orthogonal groups $\Omega _{2k+1}(q)$, $k\geq 4$. As a byproduct, we also obtain $(2,3)$-generators for $\Omega _{4k}^+(q)$ with $k\geq 3$ and q odd, and for $\Omega _{4k+2}^\pm (q)$ with $k\geq 4$ and $q\equiv \pm 1~ \mathrm {(mod~ 4)}$.

In this note, we give an alternate proof of the Farrell–Jones isomorphism conjecture for the affine Artin groups of type $\widetilde B_n$.

We initiate a systematic study of the perfection of affine group schemes of finite type over fields of positive characteristic. The main result intrinsically characterises and classifies the perfections of reductive groups and obtains a bijection with the set of classifying spaces of compact connected Lie groups topologically localised away from the characteristic. We also study the representations of perfectly reductive groups. We establish a highest weight classification of simple modules, the decomposition into blocks, and relate extension groups to those of the underlying abstract group.

We construct an unfolding path in Outer space which does not converge in the boundary, and instead it accumulates on the entire 1-simplex of projectivized length measures on a nongeometric arational ${\mathbb R}$-tree T. We also show that T admits exactly two dual ergodic projective currents. This is the first nongeometric example of an arational tree that is neither uniquely ergodic nor uniquely ergometric.

Given an affine Coxeter group W, the corresponding Shi arrangement is a refinement of the corresponding Coxeter hyperplane arrangements that was introduced by Shi to study Kazhdan–Lusztig cells for W. Shi showed that each region of the Shi arrangement contains exactly one element of minimal length in W. Low elements in W were introduced to study the word problem of the corresponding Artin–Tits (braid) group and turns out to produce automata to study the combinatorics of reduced words in W. In this article, we show, in the case of an affine Coxeter group, that the set of minimal length elements of the regions in the Shi arrangement is precisely the set of low elements, settling a conjecture of Dyer and the second author in this case. As a by-product of our proof, we show that the descent walls – the walls that separate a region from the fundamental alcove – of any region in the Shi arrangement are precisely the descent walls of the alcove of its corresponding low element.

Every countable group G can be embedded in a finitely generated group $G^*$ that is hopfian and complete, that is, $G^*$ has trivial centre and every epimorphism $G^*\to G^*$ is an inner automorphism. Every finite subgroup of $G^*$ is conjugate to a finite subgroup of G. If G has a finite presentation (respectively, a finite classifying space), then so does $G^*$. Our construction of $G^*$ relies on the existence of closed hyperbolic 3-manifolds that are asymmetric and non-Haken.

In the previous paper, we defined a new category which categorifies the Hecke algebra. This is a generalization of the theory of Soergel bimodules. To prove theorems, the existences of certain homomorphisms between Bott–Samelson bimodules are assumed. In this paper, we prove this assumption. We only assume the vanishing of certain two-colored quantum binomial coefficients.

The algebraic mapping torus $M_{\Phi }$ of a group $G$ with an automorphism $\Phi$ is the HNN-extension of $G$ in which conjugation by the stable letter performs $\Phi$. We classify the Dehn functions of $M_{\Phi }$ in terms of $\Phi$ for a number of right-angled Artin groups (RAAGs) $G$, including all $3$-generator RAAGs and $F_k \times F_l$ for all $k,l \geq 2$.

Given a group $G$ and an integer $n\geq 0$, we consider the family ${\mathcal F}_n$ of all virtually abelian subgroups of $G$ of $\textrm{rank}$ at most $n$. In this article, we prove that for each $n\ge 2$ the Bredon cohomology, with respect to the family ${\mathcal F}_n$, of a free abelian group with $\textrm{rank}$ $k \gt n$ is nontrivial in dimension $k+n$; this answers a question of Corob Cook et al. (Homology Homotopy Appl. 19(2) (2017), 83–87, Question 2.7). As an application, we compute the minimal dimension of a classifying space for the family ${\mathcal F}_n$ for braid groups, right-angled Artin groups, and graphs of groups whose vertex groups are infinite finitely generated virtually abelian groups, for all $n\ge 2$. The main tools that we use are the Mayer–Vietoris sequence for Bredon cohomology, Bass–Serre theory, and the Lück–Weiermann construction.

We prove that, given a finitely generated subgroup H of a free group F, the following questions are decidable: is H closed (dense) in F for the pro-(met)abelian topology? Is the closure of H in F for the pro-(met)abelian topology finitely generated? We show also that if the latter question has a positive answer, then we can effectively construct a basis for the closure, and the closure has decidable membership problem in any case. Moreover, it is decidable whether H is closed for the pro-$\mathbf {V}$ topology when $\mathbf {V}$ is an equational pseudovariety of finite groups, such as the pseudovariety $\mathbf {S}_k$ of all finite solvable groups with derived length $\leq k$. We also connect the pro-abelian topology with the topologies defined by abelian groups of bounded exponent.

Graph products of cyclic groups and Coxeter groups are two families of groups that are defined by labelled graphs. The family of Dyer groups contains these both families and gives us a framework to study these groups in a unified way. This paper focuses on the spherical growth series of a Dyer group D with respect to the standard generating set. We give a recursive formula for the spherical growth series of D in terms of the spherical growth series of standard parabolic subgroups. As an application we obtain the rationality of the spherical growth series of a Dyer group. Furthermore, we show that the spherical growth series of D is closely related to the Euler characteristic of D.

For a post-critically finite branched covering of the sphere that is a subdivision map of a finite subdivision rule, we define non-expanding spines which determine the existence of a Levy cycle in a non-exhaustive semi-decidable algorithm. Especially when a finite subdivision rule has polynomial growth of edge subdivisions, the algorithm terminates very quickly, and the existence of a Levy cycle is equivalent to the existence of a Thurston obstruction. To show the equivalence between Levy and Thurston obstructions, we generalize the arcs intersecting obstruction theorem by Pilgrim and Tan [Combining rational maps and controlling obstructions. Ergod. Th. & Dynam. Sys. 18(1) (1998), 221–245] to a graph intersecting obstruction theorem. As a corollary, we prove that for a pair of post-critically finite polynomials, if at least one polynomial has core entropy zero, then their mating has a Levy cycle if and only if the mating has a Thurston obstruction.

We study conjugacy classes of germs of nonflat diffeomorphisms of the real line fixing the origin. Based on the work of Takens and Yoccoz, we establish results that are sharp in terms of differentiability classes and order of tangency to the identity. The core of all of this lies in the invariance of residues under low-regular conjugacies. This may be seen as an extension of the fact (also proved in this article) that the value of the Schwarzian derivative at the origin for germs of $C^3$ parabolic diffeomorphisms is invariant under $C^2$ parabolic conjugacy, though it may vary arbitrarily under parabolic $C^1$ conjugacy.

We investigate the groups of units of one-relator and special inverse monoids. These are inverse monoids which are defined by presentations, where all the defining relations are of the form $r=1$. We develop new approaches for finding presentations for the group of units of a special inverse monoid, and apply these methods to give conditions under which the group admits a presentation with the same number of defining relations as the monoid. In particular, our results give sufficient conditions for the group of units of a one-relator inverse monoid to be a one-relator group. When these conditions are satisfied, these results give inverse semigroup theoretic analogues of classical results of Adjan for one-relator monoids, and Makanin for special monoids. In contrast, we show that in general these classical results do not hold for one-relator and special inverse monoids. In particular, we show that there exists a one-relator special inverse monoid whose group of units is not a one-relator group (with respect to any generating set), and we show that there exists a finitely presented special inverse monoid whose group of units is not finitely presented.

We investigate the translation lengths of group elements that arise in random walks on the isometry groups of Gromov hyperbolic spaces. In particular, without any moment condition, we prove that non-elementary random walks exhibit at least linear growth of translation lengths. As a corollary, almost every random walk on mapping class groups eventually becomes pseudo-Anosov, and almost every random walk on $\mathrm {Out}(F_n)$ eventually becomes fully irreducible. If the underlying measure further has finite first moment, then the growth rate of translation lengths is equal to the drift, the escape rate of the random walk.

We then apply our technique to investigate the random walks induced by the action of mapping class groups on Teichmüller spaces. In particular, we prove the spectral theorem under finite first moment condition, generalizing a result of Dahmani and Horbez.