Unitriangular basic sets, Brauer characters and coprime actions

Abstract

We show that the decomposition matrix of a given group $G$ is unitriangular, whenever $G$ has a normal subgroup $N$ such that the decomposition matrix of $N$ is unitriangular, $G/N$ is abelian and certain characters of $N$ extend to their stabilizer in $G$. Using the recent result by Brunat--Dudas--Taylor establishing that unipotent blocks have a unitriangular decomposition matrix, this allows us to prove that blocks of groups of quasi-simple groups of Lie type have a unitriangular decomposition matrix, whenever they are related via Bonnaf\'e--Dat--Rouquier's equivalence to a unipotent block. This is then applied to study the action of automorphisms on Brauer characters of finite quasi-simple groups. We use it to verify the so-called {\it inductive Brauer--Glaubermann condition}, that aims to establish a Glauberman correspondence for Brauer characters, given a coprime action.