On equality of central and class preserving automorphisms of finite \(p\)-groups. (Q395126)

An automorphism \(\alpha\) of a group \(G\) is called a class preserving automorphism if \(\alpha(x)\in x^G\) for all \(x\in G\), where \(x^G\) is the conjugacy class of \(x\); and an automorphism \(\varphi\) is called a central automorphism if \(g^{-1}\varphi(g)\in Z(G)\) for all \(g\in G\). Let \(\Aut_c(G)\) denote the set of all class preserving automorphisms and let \(\Aut_z(G)\) denote the set of all central automorphisms. The authors prove that in a finite non-Abelian \(p\)-group, \(\Aut_c(G)=\Aut_z(G)\) if and only if \(\Aut_c(G)=\Hom(G/Z(G),\gamma_2(G))\) and \(\gamma_2(G)=Z(G)\), where \(Z(G)\) is the center of \(G\) and \(\gamma_2(G)=[G,G]\) the derived subgroup of \(G\). They also classify all finite \(p\)-groups \(G\) of class 2 such that \(\Aut_c(G)=\Aut_z(G)\) and characterize all finite \(p\)-groups of order \(\leq p^7\) with the condition \(\Aut_c(G)=\Aut_z(G)\).