Related papers: Surface group representations in ${\rm SL}_2({\mat…

Let $S$ be a closed oriented surface and $G$ a finite group of orientation preserving automorphisms of $S$ whose orbit space has genus at least $2$. There is a natural group homomorphism from the $G$-centralizer in $Diff^+(S)$ to the…

Let $\Sigma_{g,n}$ be the orientable genus $g$ surface with $n$ punctures, where $2-2g-n<0$. Let $$\rho: \pi_1(\Sigma_{g,n})\to GL_m(\mathbb{C})$$ be a representation. Suppose that for each finite covering map $f: \Sigma_{g', n'}\to…

By considering appropriate finite covering spaces of closed non-orientable surfaces, we construct linear representations of their mapping class group which have finite index image in certain big arithmetic groups.

Let $(S,\, \ast)$ be a closed oriented surface with a marked point, let $G$ be a fixed group, and let $\rho\colon\pi_1(S) \longrightarrow G$ be a representation such that the orbit of $\rho$ under the action of the mapping class group…

We give a finite presentation of the mapping class group of an oriented (possibly bounded) surface of genus greater or equal than 1, considering Dehn twists on a very simple set of curves.

Let $\Sigma_{g,n}$ be an orientable surface of genus $g$ with $n$ punctures. We study actions of the mapping class group of $\Sigma_{g,n}$ via Hodge-theoretic and arithmetic techniques. We show that if $$\rho: \pi_1(\Sigma_{g,n})\to…

We investigate representations of mapping class groups of surfaces that arise from the untwisted Drinfeld double of a finite group G, focusing on surfaces without marked points or with one marked point. We obtain concrete descriptions of…

Finite presentations for the mapping class group M(F) are known for arbitrary orientable compact surface F. If F is non-orientable, then such presentations are known only when F has genus at most 3 and few boundary components. In this paper…

The genus spectrum of a finite group $G$ is the set of all $g\geq 2$ such that $G$ acts faithfully and orientation-preserving on a closed compact orientable surface of genus $g$. This article is an overview of some results relating the…

We give infinite series of groups Gamma and of compact complex surfaces of general type S with fundamental group Gamma such that 1) Any surface S' with the same Euler number as S, and fundamental group Gamma, is diffeomorphic to S. 2) The…

We show that central extensions of the mapping class group $M_g$ of the closed orientable surface of genus $g$ by $\Z$ are residually finite. Further we give rough estimates of the largest $N=N_g$ such that homomorphisms from $M_g$ to SU(N)…

We produce a sequence of finite dimensional representations of the fundamental group $\pi_1(S)$ of a closed surface where all simple closed curves act with finite order, but where each non--simple closed curve eventually acts with infinite…

Let $\Gamma$ be a finite-index subgroup of the mapping class group of a closed genus $g$ surface that contains the Torelli group. For instance, $\Gamma$ can be the level $L$ subgroup or the spin mapping class group. We show that…

For any infinite-type surface $S$, a natural question is whether the homology of its mapping class group contains any non-trivial classes that are supported on (i) a compact subsurface or (ii) a finite-type subsurface. Our purpose here is…

We classify all spherical 2-designs that arise as orbits of finite group actions on real inner product spaces. Although it is well known that such designs can occur in representations without trivial components, we give a complete…

In this paper, we classify the groups of semisimilarities of finite classical polar spaces with exactly two orbits on the singular or isotropic points. As a byproduct, we obtain many highly symmetric regular sets in the point graphs of…

We study actions of finite groups on moduli spaces of stable holomorphic vector bundles and relate the fixed-point sets of those actions to representation varieties of certain orbifold fundamental groups.

We investigate the problem of when big mapping class groups are generated by involutions. Restricting our attention to the class of self-similar surfaces, which are surfaces with self-similar ends space, as defined by Mann and Rafi, and…

We prove that for each sufficiently complicated orientable surface $S$, there exists an infinite image linear representation $\rho$ of $\pi_1(S)$ such that if $\gamma\in\pi_1(S)$ is freely homotopic to a simple closed curve on $S$, then…

Let $\Gamma_g$ denote the orientation-preserving Mapping Class Group of the genus $g\geq 1$ closed orientable surface. In this paper we show that for fixed $g$, every finite group occurs as a quotient of a finite index subgroup of…