Growth in linear groups

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The paper under review proves a long-standing conjecture of Helfgott on the structure of subsets of bounded tripling in finite linear groups of bounded rank, thereby advancing the understanding of growth phenomena in linear groups. Specifically, let \( A \) be a finite symmetric subset of \( \mathrm{GL}_n(F) \), for any field \( F \), satisfying \( |A^3| \le K |A| \). The authors establish that \( A \) is covered by \( K^{O_n(1)} \) cosets of a subgroup \( \Lambda \) normal in \( \langle A \rangle \), with \( \Lambda / H \) nilpotent of step at most \( n-1 \), where \( H \) is a subgroup contained in \( A^{O_n(1)} \). This sharp quantitative result, announced in earlier works, generalizes the celebrated structure theorem for approximate groups, which asserts that in qualitative terms the most general approximate group is an extension of a subgroup by a nilprogression, a result due to \textit{E. Breuillard} et al. [Publ. Math., Inst. Hautes Étud. Sci. 116, 115-221 (2012; Zbl 1260.20062)].\N\NAs an application, the authors also prove that the diameter of Cayley graphs of sufficiently quasirandom finite linear groups grows at most polylogarithmically with the group order.\N\NThe paper builds upon and substantially improves several previous works in the area, notably those by \textit{N. Gill} and \textit{H. A. Helfgott} [Math. Ann. 360, No. 1--2, 157--208 (2014; Zbl 1308.20043)]. A key innovation is the introduction of an affine conjugating trick, which allows the authors to bypass the use of the Nori correspondence and handle arbitrary fields uniformly. The techniques combine advanced tools from arithmetic combinatorics, group theory (including the structure theorem by \textit{B. Weisfeiler} [Ann. Math. (2) 120, 271--315 (1984; Zbl 0568.14025)] and by \textit{M. Larsen} and \textit{R. Pink} [J. Am. Math. Soc. 24, No. 4, 1105--1158 (2011; Zbl 1241.20054)]) and properties of quasirandom groups.



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