Cayley's theorem and Hopf Galois structures for semidirect products of cyclic groups. (Q868866)

Given a finite group \(G\) with group of permutations \(\text{Perm}(G)\), an embedding \(\beta\colon G\hookrightarrow\text{Perm}(G)\) is `regular' if the orbit of the identity in \(G\) under the action of \(\beta(G)\) is all of \(G\). If \(\rho\colon G\to\text{Perm}(G)\) is given by the right regular representation one can form the product \(\rho(G)\cdot\Aut(G)\leq\text{Perm}(G)\). This product is called the `holomorph' of \(G\) and is denoted \(\text{Hol}(G)\). By restricting the automorphism group to the inner automorphisms we get \(\rho(G)\cdot\text{Inn}(G)\) which is denoted \(\text{InHol}(G)\). Both the left and right regular representations are mapped into \(\text{InHol}(G)\). We say that two embeddings \(\beta,\beta'\) into \(\text{Hol}(G)\) are equivalent if there exists a \(\delta\in\Aut(G)\) such that \(\beta'(g)=\delta\beta(g)\delta^{-1}\). In this paper the authors investigate equivalence classes of regular embeddings of \(G\) into \(\text{InHol}(G)\) in the case where \(G=\mathbb{Z}_h\rtimes\mathbb{Z}_k\), \(h\) a power of an odd prime and \(G\) with trivial center. Let \(\phi\colon G\to G\) be a fixed-point free endomorphism, i.e., an endomorphism which only fixes the identity. This determines two regular embeddings \(\beta_L,\beta_R\) into \(\text{InHol}(G)\) by \(\beta_L(g)=\phi(g)g^{-1}C(g)\) and \(\beta_R(g)=g\phi(g)^{-1}C(\phi(g))\), respectively, where \(C(x)\in\text{Inn}(G)\) is conjugation by \(x\). It is shown that \(\beta_L\) and \(\beta_R\) are equivalent if and only if \(\phi\) is not an automorphism, and that every automorphism of \(G\) in fact has a fixed point. Thus there is a two-to-one correspondence between equivalence classes of regular embeddings into \(\text{InHol}(G)\) and fixed-point free endomorphisms. A formula for fixed-point free endomorphisms is given. This number, denoted \(\mathcal E(G)\), is defined to be \(\mathcal E(G)=\varphi(p^f)p^f+\varphi(p^f)(\varphi(q)-1)p^e\), where \(\varphi\) is the Euler totient function, \(h=p^e\) and \(k=qp^f\), \(q>1\), \(\gcd(q,p)=1\). Thus the number of equivalence classes of regular embeddings into \(\text{InHol}(G)\) is \(2\mathcal E(G)\). These formulas are important in the study of Hopf Galois extensions. Let \(L/K\) be a Galois extension, \(G=\text{Gal}(L/K)\). It is well-known that the equivalence classes of regular embeddings into \(\text{Hol}(G)\) correspond to Hopf Galois structures on \(L/K\). The embeddings described above provide \(2\mathcal E(G)\) Hopf Galois structures on \(L/K\). Here it is shown that if \(\beta\colon G\to\text{Hol}(G)\) is a regular embedding and if the corresponding \(K\)-Hopf algebra is \(LG^G\) (where \(G\) acts on \(LG\) via \(g(sh)=g(s)ghg^{-1}\), \(g,h\in G\), \(s\in L\)), then \(\beta\) maps into \(\text{InHol}(G)\) as well. Thus we get a one-to-one correspondence between Hopf Galois structures on \(L/K\) with \(K\)-Hopf algebra \(LG^G\) and fixed-point free endomorphisms of \(G\).