Orbit sizes and character degrees (Q1306265)

The objective of this paper is to develop criteria that guarantee that a finite group \(G\) which acts faithfully on a vector space \(V\) possesses ``many'' orbits of different sizes. This has consequences on character degrees of solvable groups. For a prime \(p\) and any integer \(m\geq 0\) we say that a \(p\)-group \(E\) is of type \(E(p,m)\) if, (i) for \(p>2\), \(E\) is extraspecial of order \(p^{1+2m}\) and exponent \(p\), or, (ii) for \(p=2\), \(E=E_1Z(E)\), where \(E_1\) is extraspecial of order \(2^{1+2m}\) and \(Z(E)\) is cyclic of order \(\leq 4\). If \(G\) is a group and \(V\) a \(G\)-module such that \(V_N\) is homogeneous for every \(N\trianglelefteq G\), then \(V\) is called a quasiprimitive \(G\)-module (and \(G\) acts quasiprimitively on \(V\)). We formulate only two typical results. Corollary 1.6. Let \(G\) be a solvable group acting faithfully and quasiprimitively on a vector space \(V\) over a finite field. Then there is an \(E\trianglelefteq G\) of type \(E(p,m)\) for a prime \(p\) and an integer \(m\geq 0\), and the following hold: (i) If \(p>2\) and \(m\geq 5\), then \(G\) has at least \(m-4\) different nontrivial orbit sizes on \(V\). (ii) Let \(p=2\) and \(m'=m\) if \(E_1\) is a central product of \(m\) dihedral groups, or \(m-1\) otherwise. If \(m'\geq 10\), then \(G\) has at least \(m-9\) different nontrivial orbit sizes on \(V\). Let \(f(G)\) be the Fitting height of a solvable group \(G\). Corollary 2.4. Let \(G\) be a group of odd order. Then \(f(G)\leq 8\cdot 32+\log_2|\text{cd}(G)|\). This result is asymptotically best possible. This result improves the former linear bound by Broline-Garrison [see Corollary 12.21 in \textit{I. M. Isaacs}' book Character theory of finite groups (1976; Zbl 0337.20005)]. The paper contains also some applications to modular character theory.