A representation theoretic characterization of simple closed curves on a surface (Q1727876)

There are many papers on algebraic and algorithmic characterizations of simple closed curves on surfaces; the first purely algebraic-combinatorial algorithm to decide the simplicity of an element in the fundamental group \(\pi_1(S)\) of a closed, orientable surface \(S\) was given by \textit{H. Zieschang} [Math. Scand. 17, 17--40 (1965; Zbl 0151.33005)], in the spirit of Dehn's solution of the word problem for \(\pi_1(S)\). In the present paper it is shown that there exists a sequence of finite dimensional complex representations of \(\pi_1(S)\) such that all simple closed curves act by automorphisms of finite order, but such that every non-simple closed curve eventually acts with infinite order. Since the sequence of representations is computable, this gives a representation theoretic algorithm to decide the simplicity of an element of \(\pi_1(S)\). The construction of the representations combines ideas from TQFT (topological quantum field theory) representations of mapping class groups (using results in another paper by the present authors, [Invent. Math. 206, No. 2, 269--292 (2016; Zbl 1400.57020)]), with effective versions of LERF (subgroup separability) for surface groups. As the authors note, the paper is motivated by the ``AMU conjecture'' for a certain sequence of representations of the mapping class group \(\text{Mod}^1(S)\) of \(S\) fixing a point, defined by the Witten-Reshetikhin-Turaev SO(3) topological quantum field theory: if a mapping class has a pseudo-Anosov piece then its image has infinite order for large indices (conjectured by \textit{J. E. Andersen}, \textit{G. Masbaum} and \textit{K. Ueno} [Math. Proc. Camb. Philos. Soc. 141, No. 3, 477--488 (2006; Zbl 1110.57009)]). The representations considered in the present paper are in fact obtained as restrictions of some of these representations of \(\text{Mod}^1(S)\) to \(\pi_1(S)\) which can be considered as a subgroup of \(\text{Mod}^1(S)\) in a natural way.