Automorphism groups of dessins d'enfants (Q1710693)

The questions considered in this paper have a long history. Hurwitz already showed that every finite group $G$ can be realized as a group of conformal automorphisms of some closed orientable Riemann surface of genus $g\ge 2$. The Riemann surface can be chosen to have $G$ as its full group of conformal automorphisms.\par Over the years there were many activities to determine, for a given finite group $G$, the minimal genus of such a Riemann surface. In recent years, a different approach was developed to consider graphs embedded in a closed orientable surface and its automorphism groups. After Grothendieck, a ``dessin d'enfant'' is a pair $D=(X,G)$, where $G$ is a bipartite graph embedded in a closed orientable surface $X$ and providing a 2-cell decomposition of $X$. An automorphism of $D$ is a graph automorphism of $G$ induced by a conformal self-homeomorphism of $X$. Let $\Aut(D)$ denote the group of automorphisms of $D$.\par Jones showed that every finite group is isomorphic to $\Aut(D)$ for some suitable dessin d'enfant $D$. Complementing this, the author shows the following.\par Let $G$ be a finite group of conformal automorphisms of a closed Riemann surface $S$ of genus $g\ge 2$. Then there exists a dessin d'enfant $D=(X,G)$, where $X$ has genus $g$, $G\cong\Aut(D)$ and the actions of $\Aut(G)$ and $G$ are topologically equivalent.\par In addition, the author describes some interesting equivalences and applications.