New combinatorial properties of linear groups (Q1840621)

Let \(G=\langle g_1,\dots,g_n \rangle\) be a finitely generated subgroup of \(\text{GL}_m(\mathbb{C})\). The authors investigate whether \(G\) is unipotent if all primitive words in \(g_1,\dots,g_n\) are unipotent. This work was inspired by a conjecture of Formanek and Zelmanov which says that if \(F_n\) is a free group of rank \(n\), \(\Gamma_n\subset\Aut(F_n)\) is the group of inner automorphisms of \(F_n\), and \(\rho\colon\Aut(F_n)\to\text{GL}_m(\mathbb{C})\) is a representation, then the group \(\rho(\Gamma_n)\) is virtually solvable (i.e., contains a solvable subgroup of finite index). By studying combinatorial problems, it is shown that under some natural conditions, \(G=\langle g_1,\dots,g_n\rangle\) is indeed unipotent. For example, if \(x,y\in\text{GL}_m(\mathbb{C})\) are such that every primitive element in \(x\) and \(y\) is unipotent with Jordan blocks of size at most 3, then the group generated by \(x\) and \(y\) is unipotent. Let \(x_1,\dots,x_n\) be a set of generators for \(\Gamma_n\), and \(V(x_i)\) the subspace of \(\rho(x_i)\)-invariant vectors. The main result of this paper says that the group \(\rho(\Gamma_n)\) is unipotent if \(\dim V(x_n)\leq n\).