Contractive automorphisms on locally compact groups (Q2266773)

If \(\tau\) is a topological automorphism of the locally compact group G then its contraction group is defind as \(C(\tau)=\{x\in G:\quad \lim_{n\geq 1}\tau^ n(x)=e\}.\) In this paper we are mainly concerned with contractible groups G i.e. one has \(G=C(\tau)\) for some \(\tau\). Examples are given by the additive groups of real or p-adic numbers and by their direct products. The first paper dealing systematically with contractible groups is due to \textit{P. R. Müller-Römer} [J. Reine Angew. Math. 283/284, 238-264 (1976; Zbl 0341.43003)]. The following result extends a theorem of Müller-Römer: A connected group G is contractible if and only if G is a simply connected (nilpotent) Lie group whose Lie algebra admits a positive graduation (Corollary 2.4). Next we consider the case of a totally disconnected contractible group G: There exists a distinguished filtration of G by compact open subgroups. These two cases are exhaustive in view of the main result of this paper: The locally compact group G is contractible if and only if G is topologically isomorphic to the direct product of two contractible groups C and D where C is connected and D is totally disconnected (Corollary 4.3). Finally we consider automorphism groups \(T=(\tau_ t)_{t>0}\) on G: The group admits a contractive group T if and only if G is contractible (Proposition 5.4). Moreover the relations between contractivity and continuity of T are studied. In a brief appendix we discuss the relevance of our results for the investigation of (semi-)stable convolution semigroups of probability measures on G. In fact this relationship was the motivation for our paper. There is a forthcoming paper by W. Hazod and the author (continuous automorphism groups on a locally compact group contracting modulo a compact subgroup) that (to a certain extent) is a direct continuation of the present paper to a more general situation.