Minimal group determinants for dicyclic groups (Q2235358): Difference between revisions

The group determinant \(\mathcal{D}_{G}(x_{g_{1}},\dots,x_{g_{n}})\) of a finite group \(G\) \(=\{g_{1},\dots,g_{n}\}\) is the determinant of the \(n\times n\) matrix whose \((i,j)\)th entry is \(x_{g_{j}g_{k}^{-1}}\), where \(\{x_{g}\mid g\in G\}\) is a set of \(n\) independent variables. Several authors have studied the sets \[ \mathcal{S}(G):=\{\ \mathcal{D}_{G}(a_{g_{1}},\dots,a_{g_{n}})\mid (a_{g_{1}},\dots,a_{g_{n}})\in \mathbb{Z}^{n}\}\subset \mathbb{Z}, \] when \(G\) belongs to certain families of finite groups, and in the paper under review the authors consider the case where \(G\) is the dicyclic group \( Q_{4n}\) of order \(4n\). Mainly, they show for \(n\) odd that \[ \min \{\left\vert d\right\vert \mid d\in \mathcal{S}(Q_{4n})\text{ and } \left\vert d\right\vert \geq 2\}=\min \{16,\ p\}, \] where \(p\) is the first prime number not dividing \(2n\). Also, they prove, for \(n\) being prime, some additional properties of the elements of \(\mathcal{S} (Q_{4n})\), which extend the complete description of the sets \(\mathcal{S} (Q_{8})\) and \(\mathcal{S}(Q_{12})\), obtained by the second author and \textit{C. J. Smyth} in [Ramanujan J. 51, No. 2, 421--453 (2020; Zbl 1451.11116)].