Unique prime decomposition results for factors coming from wreath product groups (Q374441): Difference between revisions

This paper is part of Sorin Popa's ever growing program that studies rigidity phenomena in II\(_1\)-factors. With few exceptions, examples of von Neumann algebras are constructed from groups, in two ways: Given a group \(G\), the group von Neumann algebra \(L(G)\) is the double commutant of the image of the left regular representation as unitary operators on \(\ell^2(G)\); for the second way, if \(G\) acts on a measure space \(X\), one constructs the von Neumann algebra \(L^\infty(X)\rtimes G\). Popa's program studies to which extent it is possible to recover the group \(G\) from \(L(G)\) or \(G\) and \(X\) from \(L^\infty(X)\rtimes G\). \textit{A. Connes}' fundamental work [Ann. Math. (2) 104, 73--115 (1976; Zbl 0343.46042)] shows that this is impossible for amenable groups: If \(G,H\) are amenable, then \(L(G)\) and \(L(H)\) are isomorphic. At the other end of the spectrum, a few years ago, the first examples of hyperrigid groups were obtained in [\textit{A. Ioana} et al., Ann. Math. (2) 178, No. 1, 231--286 (2013; Zbl 1295.46041)] and [\textit{M. Berbec} and \textit{S. Vaes}, Proc. Lond. Math. Soc. (3) 108, No. 5, 1116--1152 (2014; Zbl 1304.46054)]. These are groups \(G\) such that, if \(L(G)\) is isomorphic to \(L(H)\), then \(H\simeq G\). The examples were constructed by using suitable wreath products. In [Invent. Math. 156, No. 2, 223--234 (2004; Zbl 1060.46044)], \textit{N. Ozawa} and \textit{S. Popa} proved a unique decomposition result for tensor products of group factors. In the paper under review, the authors show a similar unique tensor product decomposition for wreath products of the form ``amenable by nonamenable''. Concretely, they prove the following result: Given groups \(\Gamma_1,\dots,\Gamma_n\) of the form \(\Gamma_j=A_j\wr H_j\) with \(A_j\) nontrivial countable amenable and \(H\) countable nonamenable, and given von Neumann algebras \(Q_1,\dots,Q_m\) with \(m\geq n\) and \[ L(\Gamma_1)\overline\otimes\cdots\overline\otimes L(\Gamma_n)=Q_1\overline\otimes\cdots\overline\otimes Q_m, \] then \(n=m\) and, modulo permutations, \(L(\Gamma_j)\simeq Q_j^{t_j}\), where \(t_j\geq0\) and \(\sum t_j=1\) (here \(Q^t\) means the compression \(pQp\) with a projection \(p\) in \(Q\) of trace \(t\)). An extension of the result to measure equivalent direct product decompositions is considered.