English

Strong approximation in random towers of graphs

Combinatorics 2009-05-05 v1 Group Theory

Abstract

The term "strong approximation" is used to describe phenomena where an arithmetic group as well as all of its Zariski dense subgroups have a large image in the congruence quotients. We exhibit analogues of such phenomena in a probabilistic, rather than arithmetic, setting. Let T be the binary rooted tree, Aut(T) its automorphism group. To a given m-tuple a = {a_1,a_2,...,a_m} in Aut(T), we associate a tower of 2m-regular Schreier graphs ...X_n-->X_{n-1}-->...-->X_0. The vertices of X_n are the n^{th} level of the tree and two such are connected by an edge if a generator takes one to the other. When {a_i} are independent Haar-random elements of Aut(T) we retrieve the standard model for iterated random 2-lifts studied, for example by Bilu-Linial. If w={w_1,w_2,...,w_l} are words in the free group F_m, the random substitutions w(a) := {w_1(a),...,w_l(a)} give rise to new models for random towers of 2l-regular graphs: ...Y_n-->Y_{n-1}-->...-->Y_0. With the above notation, the following hold almost surely, for every non cyclic subgroup D in F_m: (i) the graphs YnY_n have a bounded number of connected components, (ii) these connected components form a family of expander graphs, (iii) the closure of D has positive Hausdorff dimension as a subgroup of the (metric) group Aut(T).

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0905.0156,
  title  = {Strong approximation in random towers of graphs},
  author = {Yair Glasner},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0905.0156},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

30 pages, 3 figures

R2 v1 2026-06-21T12:57:27.708Z