On Schur 2-groups (Q503916)

In this paper, the authors investigate Schur 2-groups. If \(G\) is a finite group, then a subring \(\mathcal A\) of the group ring \(\mathbb Z G\) is called a Schur ring (S-ring) over \(G\) if there exists a partition \(S = S(A)\) of \(G\) such that (S1) \(e \in S\), (S2) \(X \in S \) implies \(X^{-1}\in S\) and (S3) \(\mathcal A = \mathrm{Span}\{X : X \in S\}\). The group of all permutations of a group \(G\) is denoted by \(\mathrm{Sym}(G)\). A finite group \(G\) is called a Schur group, if any \(S\)-ring over \(G\) is the transitivity module of a point stabilizer in a subgroup of Sym\((G)\) that contains all permutations induced by the right multiplications in \(G\). In [Math. Nachr. 60, 1--27 (1974; Zbl 0273.20005)], \textit{R. Pöschel} proves that for a prime \(p \geq 5\) a finite \(p\)-group \(G\) is a Schur group if and only if \(G\) is cyclic. The authors notes that: For \(p\) = 2 or 3, a cyclic \(p\)-group is still Schur, but the converse statement is not true: a straightforward computation shows that an elementary abelian group of order 4 or 9 is Schur. Let \(\mathbb Z_n\) be the cyclic group of order \(n\). In the referred paper, the following result gives a full classification of abelian Schur 2-groups. Theorem 1.1. An abelian 2-group \(G\) is Schur if and only if \(G\) is cyclic, or elementary abelian of order at most 32, or is isomorphic to \(\mathbb Z_2\times \mathbb Z_{2^n}\) for some \(n \geq 1\). It is also proved that i) the non-abelian Schur 2-groups are known except the dihedral groups and the groups \(M_{2^n} =\langle a, b : a^{2^{n-1}}= b^2 = 1, bab = a^{1+2^{n-2}}\rangle\) where \(n \geq 4\) and ii) that for \(n \geq 4\) the latter groups are not Schur (Theorem 11.1). They also obtain that a non-abelian Schur 2-group of order at least 32 is dihedral (Theorem 1.2). In the following result, the authors denote the rank of the \(S\)-ring \(\mathcal A\) by \(\mathrm{rk}(\mathcal A)\): Theorem 1.3. Let be \(\mathcal A\) an \(S\)-ring over a dihedral 2-group. Suppose that \(\mathrm{rk}(\mathcal A ) \leq 5\). Then one of the following statements is true: (1) \(\mathcal A\) is isomorphic to an \(S\)-ring over \(\mathbb Z_2\times \mathbb Z_{2^n}\), (2) \(\mathcal A\) is a proper dot or wreath product, (3) \((\mathcal A )\) = 5 and \(\mathcal A\) is associated with a divisible difference set in \(Z_{2^n}\). Theorem 1.1 and (1) imply that the S-rings over \(\mathbb Z_2\times \mathbb Z_{2^n}\) are Schurian and that the S-rings of statement (2) are also Schurian. In Section 12.1, the authors introduce the concept of a divisible difference set in a cyclic 2-group and prove the following result: Corollary 1.4. Under the hypothesis of Theorem 1.3, the S-ring \(\mathcal A\) is not Schurian only if \(\mathcal A\) is associated with a divisible difference set in a cyclic 2-group. The authors conclude that the question whether a dihedral 2-group is Schur 2-group remains open.