arXiv subjects

Rieuwert J. Blok

Publications and source records attributed to Rieuwert J. Blok.

12 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2016

Realizations and properties of $3$-spherical Curtis-Tits Groups and Phan groups

In this note we establish the existence of all Curtis-Tits groups and Phan groups with $3$-spherical diagram as classified previously and investigate some of their geometric and group theoretic properties. Whereas it is known that orientable Curtis-Tits groups with spherical or non-spherical and non-affine diagram are almost simple, we show that non-orientable Curtis-Tits groups are acylindrically hyperbolic and therefore have infinitely many infinite-index normal subgroups. However, we also provide concrete examples of non-orientable Curtis-Tits groups whose quotients are finite simple groups of Lie type.

math.GR↗

arXiv2016

Classification of Curtis-Tits and Phan amalgams with $3$-spherical diagram

We classify all non-collapsing Curtis-Tits and Phan amalgams with $3$-spherical diagram over all fields. In particular, we show that amalgams with spherical diagram are unique, a result required by the classification of finite simple groups. We give a simple condition on the amalgam which is necessary and sufficient for it to arise from a group of Kac-Moody type. This also yields a definition of a large class of groups of Kac-Moody type in terms of a finite presentation.

math.GR↗

arXiv2015

Curtis-Tits Groups of simply-laced type

The classification of Curtis-Tits amalgams with {connected}, triangle free, simply-laced diagram over a field of size at least $4$ was completed in~\cite{BloHof2014b}. Orientable amalgams are those arising from applying the Curtis-Tits theorem to groups of Kac-Moody type, and indeed, their universal completions are central extensions of those groups of Kac-Moody type. The paper~\cite{BloHof2014a} exhibits concrete (matrix) groups as completions for all Curtis-Tits amalgams with diagram $\widetilde{A}_{n-1}$. For non-orientable amalgams these groups are symmetry groups of certain unitary forms over a ring of skew Laurent polynomials. In the present paper we generalize this to all amalgams arising from the classification above and, under some additional conditions, exhibit their universal completions as central extensions of twisted groups of Kac-Moody type.

math.GR↗

arXiv2015

Curtis-Tits groups generalizing Kac-Moody groups of type $\widetilde{A}_n$

In a previous paper we define a Curtis-Tits group as a certain generalization of a Kac-Moody group. We distinguish between orientable and non-orientable Curtis-Tits groups and identify all orientable Curtis-Tits groups as Kac-Moody groups associated to twin-buildings. In the present paper we construct all orientable and non-orientable Curtis-Tits groups with diagram $\widetilde{A}_n$ over a field ${\mathbb F}$. The resulting groups are quite interesting in their own right. The orientable ones are related to Drinfel'd' s construction of vector bundles over a non-commutative projective line and to the classical groups over cyclic algebras. The non-orientable ones are related to q-CCR algebras in physics and have symplectic, orthogonal and unitary groups as quotients.

math.GR↗

arXiv2015

$1$-cohomology of simplicial amalgams of groups

We develop a cohomological method to classify amalgams of groups. We generalize this to simplicial amalgams in any concrete category. We compute the non-commutative 1-cohomology for several examples of amalgams defined over small simplices.

math.GR↗

arXiv2011

Coxeter-Chein Loops

In 1974 Orin Chein discovered a new family of Moufang loops which are now called Chein loops. Such a loop can be created from any group $W$ together with $\mathbb{Z}_2$ by a variation on a semi-direct product. We study these loops in the case where $W$ is a Coxeter group and show that it has what we call a Chein-Coxeter system, a small set of generators of order 2, together with a set of relations closely related to the Coxeter relations and Chein relations. As a result we are able to give amalgam presentations for Coxeter-Chein loops. This is to our knowledge the first such presentation for a Moufang loop.

math.GR↗

arXiv2010

On flips of unitary buildings I: Classification of flips

We classify flips of buildings arising from non-degenerate unitary spaces of dimension at least 4 over finite fields of odd characteristic in terms of their action on the underlying vector space. We also construct certain geometries related to flips and prove that these geometries are flag transitive.

math.GR↗

arXiv2010

Projective Subgrassmannians of Polar Grassmannians

In this short note, completing a sequence of studies by Cooperstein, Kasikova and Shult, we consider the k-Grassmannians of a number of polar geometries of finite rank n. We classify those subspaces that are isomorphic to the j-Grassmannian of a projective m-space. In almost all cases, these are parabolic, that is, they are the residues of a flag of the polar geometry. Exceptions only occur when the subspace is isomorphic to the Grassmannian of 2-spaces in a projective m-space and we describe these in some detail. This Witt-type result implies that automorphisms of the Grassmannian are almost always induced by automorphisms of the underlying polar space.

math.GR↗

arXiv2010

The generating rank of the unitary and symplectic Grassmannians

We prove that the Grassmannian of totally isotropic $k$-spaces of the polar space associated to the unitary group $\mathsf{SU}_{2n}(\mathbb{F})$ ($n\in \mathbb{N}$) has generating rank ${2n\choose k}$ when $\mathbb{F}\ne \mathbb{F}_4$. We also reprove the main result of Blok [Blok2007], namely that the Grassmannian of totally isotropic $k$-spaces associated to the symplectic group $\mathsf{Sp}_{2n}(\mathbb{F})$ has generating rank ${2n\choose k}-{2n\choose k-2}$, when $\rm{Char}(\mathbb{F})\ne 2$.

math.CO↗

arXiv2010

Highest weight modules and polarized embeddings of shadow spaces

Let Gamma be the K-shadow space of a spherical building Delta. An embedding V of Gamma is called polarized if it affords all "singular" hyperplanes of Gamma. Suppose that Delta is associated to a Chevalley group G. Then Gamma can be embedded into what we call the Weyl module for G of highest weight lambda_K. It is proved that this module is polarized and that the associated minimal polarized embedding is precisely the irreducible G-module of highest weight lambda_K. In addition a number of general results on polarized embeddings of shadow spaces are proved. The last few sections are devoted to the study of specific shadow spaces, notably minuscule weight geometries, polar grassmannians, and projective flag-grassmannians. The paper is in part expository in nature so as to make this material accessible to a wide audience.

math.GR↗

arXiv2009

Bass-Serre theory and counting rank two amalgams

An amalgam of groups can be viewed as a Sudoku game inside a group. You are given a set of subgroups and their intersections and you need to decide what the largest group containing such a structure can be. In a recent paper (0907.1388v1) we used Bass-Serre theory of graphs of groups to classify all possible amalgams of Curtis-Tits shape with a given diagram. This note describes the method for general rank two amalgams.

math.GR↗

arXiv2006

A Quasi Curtis-Tits-Phan theorem for the symplectic group

We obtain the symplectic group as an amalgam of low rank subgroups akin to Levi components. We do this by having the group act flag-transitively on a new type of geometry and applying Tits' lemma. This provides a new way of recognizing the symplectic groups from a small collection of small subgroups. The geometry consists of all subspaces of maximal rank in a vector space of maximal rank with respect to a symplectic form. The main result holds for fields of size at least 3. We analyze the geometry over the field of size 2 and describe its simply connected cover if different from the geometry.

math.GR↗