English

Automorphic orbits in free groups: words versus subgroups

Group Theory 2018-04-25 v3

Abstract

We show that the following problems are decidable in a rank 2 free group F_2: does a given finitely generated subgroup H contain primitive elements? and does H meet the orbit of a given word u under the action of G, the group of automorphisms of F_2? Moreover, decidability subsists if we allow H to be a rational subset of F_2, or alternatively if we restrict G to be a rational subset of the set of invertible substitutions (a.k.a. positive automorphisms). In higher rank, we show the decidability of the following weaker problem: given a finitely generated subgroup H, a word u and an integer k, does H contain the image of u by some k-almost bounded automorphism? An automorphism is k-almost bounded if at most one of the letters has an image of length greater than k.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0809.4386,
  title  = {Automorphic orbits in free groups: words versus subgroups},
  author = {Pedro Silva and Pascal Weil},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0809.4386},
  year   = {2018}
}

Comments

The third version contains additional results, and the material is presented in a different, hopefully clearer fashion

R2 v1 2026-06-21T11:24:07.402Z