Related papers: The quaternion group as a subgroup of the sphere b…

We study the problem of determining the isomorphism classes of the virtually cyclic subgroups of the n-string braid groups B_n(S^2) of the 2-sphere S^2. If n is odd, or if n is even and sufficiently large, we obtain the complete…

Let n\geq 3. We classify the finite groups which are realised as subgroups of the sphere braid group B_n(S^2). Such groups must be of cohomological period 2 or 4. Depending on the value of n, we show that the following are the maximal…

We study $K$-theoretical aspects of the braid groups $B\_n(\mathbb{S}^{2})$ on $n$ strings of the $2$-sphere, which by results of the second two authors, are known to satisfy the Farrell-Jones fibred isomorphism conjecture~\cite{JM}. In…

For $n$ at least 7 and $n$ equal to 5, we give generating sets of size 2 for the commutator subgroup of the braid group on $n$ strands. These generating sets are of the smallest possible cardinality. For $n$ equal to 4 or 6, we give…

Let $M$ be the disk or a compact, connected surface without boundary different from the sphere $S^2$ and the real projective plane $\mathbb{R}P^2$, and let $N$ be a compact, connected surface (possibly with boundary). It is known that the…

Our aim is to determine the lower central series (LCS) and derived series (DS) for the braid groups of the sphere and of the finitely-punctured sphere. We show that for all n (resp. all n\geq 5), the LCS (resp. DS) of the n-string braid…

We show that all spin groups of non-definite, quinary quadratic forms over a field with characteristic 0 can be represented as 2 by 2 matrices with entries in an associated quaternion algebra. Over local and global fields, we further study…

We consider normal subgroups $N$ of the braid group $B_n$ such that the quotient $B_n/N$ is an extension of the symmetric group by an abelian group. We show that, if $n\geq 4$, then there are exactly 8 commensurability classes of such…

We prove that the symmetric group $S_n$ is the smallest non-cyclic quotient of the braid group $B_n$ for $n=5,6$ and that the alternating group $A_n$ is the smallest non-trivial quotient of the commutator subgroup $B_n'$ for $n = 5,6,7,8$.…

We classify the (finite and infinite) virtually cyclic subgroups of the pure braid groups $P_{n}(RP^2)$ of the projective plane. The maximal finite subgroups of $P_{n}(RP^2)$ are isomorphic to the quaternion group of order 8 if $n=3$, and…

Let n be greater than or equal to 3. We study the quotient group B\_n/[P n,P\_n] of the Artin braid group B\_n by the commutator subgroup of its pure Artin braid group P\_n. We show that B\_n/[P n,P\_n] is a crystallographic group, and in…

Let $VB_n$, resp. $WB_n$ denote the virtual, resp. welded, braid group on $n$ strands. We study their commutator subgroups $VB_n' = [VB_n, VB_n]$ and, $WB_n' = [WB_n, WB_n]$ respectively. We obtain a set of generators and defining relations…

Let $WB_n$ be the welded (or loop) braid group on n strands, $n \geq 3$. We investigate commutator subgroup of $WB_n$. We prove that the commutator subgroup $WB_n'$ is finitely generated and Hopfian. We show that $WB_n'$ is perfect if and…

The quaternion equation X^n=A is solved for any integer number n > 1. A is a given quaternion with komplex numbers as its elements. We use the isomorphism between quaternions and (4,4)-matrices to solve this equation.

G. Prasad and A. Rapinchuk asked if two quaternion division F -algebras that have the same subfields are necessarily isomorphic. The answer is known to be "no" for some very large fields. We prove that the answer is "yes" if F is an…

Dehornoy showed that the Artin braid groups $B_n$ are left-orderable. This ordering is discrete, but we show that, for $n >2$ the Dehornoy ordering, when restricted to certain natural subgroups, becomes a dense ordering. Among subgroups…

Let $B'_n$ be the commutator subgroup of the braid group $B_n$. We prove that $Aut(B'_n)=Aut(B_n)$ for $n\ge4$. This answers a question asked by Vladimir Lin.

We define pseudo-Garside groups and prove a theorem about them parallel to Garside's result on the word problem for the usual braid groups. The main novelty is that the set of simple elements can be infinite. We introduce a group B=B(Z^n)…

The first open case of the Brown, Erd\H{o}s, S\'os conjecture is equivalent to the following; For every $c>0$ there is a threshold $n_0$ so that if a quasigroup has order $n\geq n_0$ then for every subset of triples of the form $(a,b,ab),$…

We give details of a formerly known relation between ternary quadratic forms and quaternion orders through the even Clifford algebra. Based on this and classifications of ternary quadratic forms we give a completely explicit classification…