Related papers: Non-elementary amenable subgroups of automata grou…

Richard Thompson's group F is the group of piecewise linear homeomorphisms of the unit interval with a finite number of break points, all at dyadic rational numbers (their denominators are powers of 2) and with slopes which are powers of 2.…

We study the class of groups generated by automata that act essentially freely on the boundary of a rooted tree. In the process we establish and discuss some general tools for determining if a group belongs to this class, and explore the…

In this paper we study the generic, i.e., typical, behavior of finitely generated subgroups of hyperbolic groups and also the generic behavior of the word problem for amenable groups. We show that a random set of elements of a nonelementary…

We consider sequences of finitely generated discrete subgroups Gamma_i=rho_i(Gamma) of a rank 1 Lie group G, where the representations rho_i are not necessarily faithful. We show that, for algebraically convergent sequences (Gamma_i),…

We construct, for the first time, various types of specific non-special finite $p$-groups having abelian automorphism group. More specifically, we construct groups $G$ with abelian automorphism group such that $\gamma_2(G) < \mathrm{Z}(G) <…

We consider a generalisation of the Basilica group to all odd primes: the $p$-Basilica groups acting on the $p$-adic tree. We show that the $p$-Basilica groups have the $p$-congruence subgroup property but not the congruence subgroup…

A topological group $G$ is extremely amenable if every continuous action of $G$ on a compact space has a fixed point. Using the concentration of measure techniques developed by Gromov and Milman, we prove that the group of automorphisms of…

Let G be a locally compact group, and ZL1(G) be the centre of its group algebra. We show that when $G$ is compact ZL1(G) is not amenable when G is either nonabelian and connected, or is a product of infinitely many finite nonabelian groups.…

We prove that non-abelian free groups of finite rank at least 3 or of countable rank are not $\forall$-homogeneous. We answer three open questions from Kharlampovich, Myasnikov, and Sklinos regarding whether free groups, finitely generated…

It is shown that for a locally compact group $G$, if $L^{1}(G)^{**}$ is approximately weakly amenable, then $M(G)$ is approximately weakly amenable. Then, new notions of approximate weak amenability and approximate cyclic amenability for…

I. M. Chiswell has asked whether every group that admits a free isometric action (without inversions) on a $\Lambda$-tree is orderable. We give an example of a multiple HNN extension $\Gamma$ which acts freely on a $\mathbb{Z}^2$-tree but…

We study amenability of affine algebras (based on the notion of almost-invariant finite-dimensional subspace), and apply it to algebras associated with finitely generated groups. We show that a group G is amenable if and only if its group…

We give a complete characterization of countable primitive groups in several settings including linear groups, subgroups of mapping class groups, groups acting minimally on trees and convergence groups. The latter category includes as a…

We study the automorphism groups of countable homogeneous directed graphs (and some additional homogeneous structures) from the point of view of topological dynamics. We determine precisely which of these automorphism groups are amenable…

Let $(X, \sigma)$ be a transitive sofic shift and let $\rm{Aut}(X)$ denote its automorphism group. We generalize a result of Frisch, Schlank, and Tamuz to show that any normal amenable subgroup of $\rm{Aut}(X)$ must be contained in the…

This paper continues math.GR/0608302's study of amenability of affine algebras (based on the notion of almost-invariant finite-dimensional subspace), and applies it to graded algebras associated with finitely generated groups. Due to a…

We construct the first examples of residually finite amenable groups that are not Hilbert-Schmidt (HS) stable. We construct finitely generated, class 3 nilpotent by cyclic examples and solvable linear finitely presented examples. This also…

We study Sushchansky p-groups. We recall the original definition and translate it into the language of automata groups. The original actions of Sushchansky groups on p-ary tree are not level-transitive and we describe their orbit trees.…

We prove that every linear-activity automaton group is amenable. The proof is based on showing that a sufficiently symmetric random walk on a specially constructed degree 1 automaton group -- the mother group -- has asymptotic entropy 0.…

We prove that weak amenability of a locally compact group imposes a strong condition on its amenable closed normal subgroups. This extends non weak amenability results of Haagerup (1988) and Ozawa--Popa (2010). A von Neumann algebra…