Coherence, local quasiconvexity, and the perimeter of 2-complexes. (Q2571743): Difference between revisions

The main aim of this investigation is the study of conditions under which a group is `coherent' or `locally quasiconvex', and the construction of classes of such groups. A group is said to be coherent if all its finitely generated subgroups are finitely presented. Well known examples of coherent groups are free groups, surface groups, polycyclic groups, 3-manifold groups. Interest in coherence of various groups has also been promoted by the possibility to perform calculations in such groups. Special attention is paid to coherence of one-relator groups because of a problem of G.~Baumslag of 1973: Is every one-relator group coherent? The criteria here are based on a new notion called ``perimeter''. Roughly speaking, given a map \(Y\to X\) between 2-complexes, the perimeter of \(Y\) (which is denoted by \({\mathbf P}(Y)\)) is a measure of how large the ``boundary'' of \(Y\) is relative to \(X\). Here are some of the applications of the method: Theorem 8.3. Let \(W\) be a cyclically reduced word and let \(G=\langle a_1,\dots\mid W^n\rangle\). If \(n\geq|W|-1\), then \(G\) is coherent. In particular, for every word \(W\) the group \(G=\langle a_1,\dots\mid W^n\rangle\) is coherent provided that \(n\) is sufficiently large. This result has a modification for multi-relator groups (Theorem 13.7). Another property studied in the paper is `local quasiconvexity'. A subgroup \(H\) of a group \(G\) generated by \(A\) is quasiconvex if the 0-cells corresponding to \(H\) form a quasiconvex subspace of the Cayley graph \(\Gamma(G,A)\). A group is locally quasiconvex if all its finitely generated subgroups are quasiconvex. Theorem 13.4. Let \(G=\langle a_1,\dots\mid W^n\rangle\) be a one-relator group with \(n\geq|W|\). Then \(G\) is locally quasiconvex. Theorem~13.7 also contains a multi-relator version of this result. A small cancellation application of this theory is: Theorem~13.3. Let \(G=\langle a_1,\dots\mid R_1,\dots\rangle\) be a small cancellation presentation which satisfies \(C'(1/n)\). If each \(a_i\) occurs at most \(n/3\) times among the \(R_j\), then \(G\) is coherent and locally quasiconvex. The results mentioned above are based on technical results: Theorem 3.7 and Theorem 3.9. The authors stress the following Qualitative summary: If a presentation has a large number of generators relative to the sum of the lengths of the relators, and the relators are relatively long and sufficiently spread out among the generators, then the group is coherent and locally quasiconvex.