arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Gabriel Verret.
We prove that every finite arc-transitive graph of valency twice a prime admits a nontrivial semiregular automorphism, that is, a non-identity automorphism whose cycles all have the same length. This is a special case of the Polycirculant Conjecture, which states that all finite vertex-transitive digraphs admit such automorphisms.
In this paper, we introduce a method for finding all edge-transitive graphs of small order, using faithful representations of transitive permutation groups of small degree, and we explain how we used this method to find all edge-transitive graphs of order up to $47$, and all bipartite edge-transitive graphs of order up to $63$. We also give an answer to a 1967 question of Folkman about semi-symmetric graphs of large valency; in fact we show that for semi-symmetric graphs of order $2n$ and valency $d$, the ratio $d/n$ can be arbitrarily close to $1$.
We obtain upper bounds on the composition length of a finite permutation group in terms of the degree and the number of orbits, and analogous bounds for primitive, quasiprimitive and semiprimitive groups. Similarly, we obtain upper bounds on the composition length of a finite completely reducible linear group in terms of some of its parameters. In almost all cases we show that the bounds are sharp, and describe the extremal examples.
Given integers $k$ and $m$, we construct a $G$-arc-transitive graph of valency $k$ and an $L$-arc-transitive oriented digraph of out-valency $k$ such that $G$ and $L$ both admit blocks of imprimitivity of size $m$.
Let $q$ be a power of a prime $p$ and let $G$ be a completely reducible subgroup of $\mathrm{GL}(d,q)$. We prove that the number of composition factors of $G$ that have prime order $p$ is at most $(\varepsilon_q d-1)/(p-1)$, where $\varepsilon_q$ is a function of $q$ satisfying $1\leqslant\varepsilon_q\leqslant 3/2$. For every $q$, we give examples showing this bound is sharp infinitely often.
A Cayley graph on a group $G$ has a natural edge-colouring. We say that such a graph is CCA if every automorphism of the graph that preserves this edge-colouring is an element of the normaliser of the regular representation of $G$. A group $G$ is then said to be CCA if every Cayley graph on $G$ is CCA. Our main result is a characterisation of non-CCA graphs on groups that are Sylow cyclic and whose order is not divisible by four. We also provide several new constructions of non-CCA graphs.
A Cayley graph for a group $G$ is CCA if every automorphism of the graph that preserves the edge-orbits under the regular representation of $G$ is an element of the normaliser of $G$. A group $G$ is then said to be CCA if every connected Cayley graph on $G$ is CCA. We show that a finite simple group is CCA if and only if it has no element of order 4. We also show that "many" 2-groups are non-CCA.
Let $Γ=\mathrm{Cay}(G,S)$ be a Cayley digraph on a group $G$ and let $A=\mathrm{Aut}(Γ)$. The Cayley index of $Γ$ is $|A:G|$. It has previously been shown that, if $p$ is a prime, $G$ is a cyclic $p$-group and $A$ contains a noncyclic regular subgroup, then the Cayley index of $Γ$ is superexponential in $p$. We present evidence suggesting that cyclic groups are exceptional in this respect. Specifically, we establish the contrasting result that, if $p$ is an odd prime and $G$ is abelian but not cyclic, and has order a power of $p$ at least $p^3$, then there is a Cayley digraph $Γ$ on $G$ whose Cayley index is just $p$, and whose automorphism group contains a nonabelian regular subgroup.
Let $Γ$ be a finite $G$-vertex-transitive digraph. The in-local action of $(Γ,G)$ is the permutation group $L_-$ induced by the vertex-stabiliser on the set of in-neighbours of $v$. The out-local action $L_+$ is defined analogously. Note that $L_-$ and $L_+$ may not be isomorphic. We thus consider the problem of determining which pairs $(L_-,L_+)$ are possible. We prove some general results, but pay special attention to the case when $L_-$ and $L_+$ are both quasiprimitive. (Recall that a permutation group is quasiprimitive if each of its nontrivial normal subgroups is transitive.) Along the way, we prove a structural result about pairs of finite quasiprimitive groups of the same degree, one being (abstractly) isomorphic to a proper quotient of the other.
We classify finite primitive permutation groups having a suborbit of length 5. As a corollary, we obtain a classification of finite vertex-primitive graphs of valency 5. In the process, we also classify finite almost simple groups that have a maximal subgroup isomorphic to $\mathrm{Alt}(5)$ or $\mathrm{Sym}(5)$.
Let S be a finite generating set of a torsion-free, nilpotent group G. We show that every automorphism of the Cayley graph Cay(G;S) is affine. (That is, every automorphism of the graph is obtained by composing a group automorphism with multiplication by an element of the group.) More generally, we show that if Cay(G;S) and Cay(G';S') are connected Cayley graphs of finite valency on two nilpotent groups G and G', then every isomorphism from Cay(G;S) to Cay(G';S') factors through to a well-defined affine map from G/N to G'/N', where N and N' are the torsion subgroups of G and G', respectively. For the special case where the groups are abelian, these results were previously proved by A.A.Ryabchenko and C.Loeh, respectively.
For an integer $k\geq 1$, a graph is called a $k$-circulant if its automorphism group contains a cyclic semiregular subgroup with $k$ orbits on the vertices. We show that, if $k$ is even, there exist infinitely many cubic arc-transitive $k$-circulants. We conjecture that, if $k$ is odd, then a cubic arc-transitive $k$-circulant has order at most $6k^2$. Our main result is a proof of this conjecture when $k$ is squarefree and coprime to $6$.
A (2,*)-group is a group that can be generated by two elements, one of which is an involution. We describe the method we have used to produce a census of all (2,*)-groups of order at most 6 000. Various well-known combinatorial structures are closely related to (2,*)-groups and we also obtain censuses of these as a corollary.
A permutation group is called semiprimitive if each of its normal subgroups is either transitive or semiregular. Given nontrivial finite transitive permutation groups $L_1$ and $L_2$ with $L_1$ not semiprimitive, we construct an infinite family of rank two amalgams of permutation type $[L_1,L_2]$ and Borel subgroups of strictly increasing order. As an application, we show that there is no bound on the order of edge-stabilisers in locally $[L_1,L_2]$ graphs. We also consider the corresponding question for amalgams of rank $k\geq 3$. We completely resolve this by showing that the order of the Borel subgroup is bounded by the permutation type $[L_1,...,L_k]$ only in the trivial case where each of $L_1,...,L_k$ is regular.
We consider vertex-primitive digraphs having two vertices with almost equal neighbourhoods (that is, the set of vertices that are neighbours of one but not the other is small). We prove a structural result about such digraphs and then apply it to answer a question of Araújo and Cameron about synchronising groups.
We show that there exist functions $c$ and $g$ such that, if $k$, $n$ and $d$ are positive integers with $d> g(n)$ and $Γ$ is a $d$-valent $2$-arc-transitive graph of order $kp^n$ with $p$ a prime, then $p\leqslant kc(d)$. In other words, there are only finitely many $d$-valent 2-arc-transitive graphs of order $kp^n$ with $d>g(n)$ and $p$ prime. This generalises a recent result of Conder, Li and Potočnik.
A transitive permutation group is called elusive if it contains no semiregular element. We show that no group of automorphisms of a connected graph of valency at most four is elusive and determine all the elusive groups of automorphisms of connected digraphs of out-valency at most three.
A CIS graph is a graph in which every maximal stable set and every maximal clique intersect. A graph is well-covered if all its maximal stable sets are of the same size, co-well-covered if its complement is well-covered, and vertex-transitive if, for every pair of vertices, there exists an automorphism of the graph mapping one to the other. We show that a vertex-transitive graph is CIS if and only if it is well-covered, co-well-covered, and the product of its clique and stability numbers equals its order. A graph is irreducible if no two distinct vertices have the same neighborhood. We classify irreducible well-covered CIS graphs with clique number at most 3 and vertex-transitive CIS graphs of valency at most 7, which include an infinite family. We also exhibit an infinite family of vertex-transitive CIS graphs which are not Cayley.