Homomorphisms into totally disconnected, locally compact groups with dense image

Let {\phi:G\rightarrow H} be a group homomorphism such that H is a totally disconnected locally compact (t.d.l.c.) group and the image of ϕ is dense. We show that all such homomorphisms arise as completions of G with respect to uniformities of a particular kind. Moreover, H is determined up to a compact normal subgroup by the pair {(G,\phi^{-1}(L))} , where L is a compact open subgroup of H. These results generalize the well-known properties of profinite completions to the locally compact setting.

The tower of profinite completions

We show that the tower of profinite completions of a nonstrongly complete profinite group continues indefinitely.

Warped cones over profinite completions

We construct metric spaces that do not have property A yet are coarsely embeddable into the Hilbert space. Our examples are so-called warped cones, which were introduced by J. Roe to serve as examples of spaces non-embeddable into a Hilbert space and with or without property A. The construction provides the first examples of warped cones combining coarse embeddability and lack of property A. We also construct warped cones over manifolds with isometrically embedded expanders and generalise Roe’s criteria for the lack of property A or coarse embeddability of a warped cone. Along the way, it is proven that property A of the warped cone over a profinite completion is equivalent to amenability of the group. In the Appendix we solve a problem of Nowak regarding his examples of spaces with similar properties.

Maximal Subgroups and Irreducible Representations of Generalized Multi-Edge Spinal Groups

Let p ≥ 3 be a prime. A generalized multi-edge spinal group $$G = \langle \{ a\} \cup \{ b_i^{(j)} {\rm \mid }1 \le j \le p,\, 1 \le i \le r_j\} \rangle \le {\rm Aut}(T)$$ is a subgroup of the automorphism group of a regular p-adic rooted tree T that is generated by one rooted automorphism a and p families $b^{(j)}_{1}, \ldots, b^{(j)}_{r_{j}}$ of directed automorphisms, each family sharing a common directed path disjoint from the paths of the other families. This notion generalizes the concepts of multi-edge spinal groups, including the widely studied GGS groups (named after Grigorchuk, Gupta and Sidki), and extended Gupta–Sidki groups that were introduced by Pervova [‘Profinite completions of some groups acting on trees, J. Algebra310 (2007), 858–879’]. Extending techniques that were developed in these more special cases, we prove: generalized multi-edge spinal groups that are torsion have no maximal subgroups of infinite index. Furthermore, we use tree enveloping algebras, which were introduced by Sidki [‘A primitive ring associated to a Burnside 3-group, J. London Math. Soc.55 (1997), 55–64’] and Bartholdi [‘Branch rings, thinned rings, tree enveloping rings, Israel J. Math.154 (2006), 93–139’], to show that certain generalized multi-edge spinal groups admit faithful infinite-dimensional irreducible representations over the prime field ℤ/pℤ.