Extensions of automorphisms of self-similar groups (Q1983947)

Let \(A\) be a non empty set, the free monoid on \(A\) is denoted by \(A^{\ast}\). \(A^{\ast}\) can be identified with the regular \(A\)-ary rooted tree \(T_{A}\) with root the empty word. Such an automorphism of \(T_{A}\) is a permutation of \(A^{\ast}\) which preserves length and the prefix relation. Every \(\varphi \in \Aut(T_{Α})\) induces an action on the boundary of \(T_{A}\), i.e. on the set \(A^{\omega }\) of all right infinite words. It is known that \(\Aut(T_{Α})\) is isomorphic to the infinite wreath product \(S_{A}\wr S_{A} \wr \cdots\), where \(S_{A}\) is the symmetric group on \(A\). From this decomposition, it follows that for every \(\varphi \in \Aut(T_{Α})\) and \(u\in A^{\ast}\), there exists an \(\varphi _{u}\in S_{A}\) such that \((ua)\varphi =(u)\varphi (a)\varphi _{u}\), for every \(a\in A\). The permutation \(\varphi _{u}\) is called the local permutation induced by \(\varphi\) at vertex \(u\). From this, it follows that for \(\varphi \in \Aut(T_{A})\) the cone automorphism \(\varphi _{uA^{\ast}}\) is defined by \((uv)\varphi = (u)\varphi (v)\varphi _{uA^{\ast}}\), for every \(v \in A^{\ast}\). A subgroup \(G\leq \Aut(T_{a})\) is called self-similar if \(\varphi _{uA^{\ast}}\in G\), for all \(\varphi \in G\) and \(u\in A^{\ast}\). Automorphisms of self-similar groups have been studied in detail [\textit{Y. Lavreniuk} and \textit{V. Nekrashevych}, Geom. Dedicata 89, 159--179 (2002; Zbl 0993.05050); \textit{L. Bartholdi} and \textit{S. N. Sidki}, Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 358, No. 1, 329--358 (2006; Zbl 1138.20039)]. For a finite non empty alphabet \(A\), on \(\Aut(T_{A})\) a metric (depth metric) is defined as follows. Given \(\varphi ,\psi \in \Aut(T_{A})\), let \(d(\varphi ,\psi )=2^{-m}\), if \(\varphi \not =\psi\), where \(m=\min \{n\in \mathbb{N}\mid \phi _{\mid A^{n}}\not = \psi _{\mid A^{n}}\}\) with \(A_{n}\) the \(n\)-th level of the tree \(T_{A}\), and \(d(\phi ,\psi )=0\) if \(\varphi =\psi\). For a \(G\leq \Aut(T_{A})\), \(\bar{G}\) denotes the closure of \(G\) with respect the depth metric. If \(G\leq \Aut(T_{A})\) is a self-similar subgroup, then the closure \(\bar{G}\) is a self-similar subgroup of \(\Aut(T_{A})\) (Lemma 3.2 in the paper). In the present paper, the authors study some self-similar groups and their automorphisms. More precisely, they investigate their continuity with respect to the depth metric and whether they can be extended to automorphisms of the full group of tree automorphisms of the infinite binary rooted tree. To obtain this, they define a Mealy machine (for the definition see in the paper ) \(\mathcal{M}\) and the automaton group \(\mathcal{G}(\mathcal{M})\) generated by \(\mathcal{M}\). Automata groups are precisely the finitely generated self-groups. The direct product of two automaton groups is an automaton group (Lemma 4.7 in the paper). A Mealy machine (the adding machine) \(\mathcal{A}\)) is defined, where the automaton group \(\mathcal{G}(\mathcal{A})\) is infinite cyclic (Example 2.1 in the paper). Theorem 1.2. There exists an example of a self-similar group \(G\leq \Aut(T_{A})\) and an automorphism \(\vartheta : G \longrightarrow G\) not admitting a continuous extension on \(\bar{G}\). The construction of the example is based on Proposition 4.3 and Lemma 4.7 in the paper. As a special case of the constructed example, the following is given: Consider the profinite group \(\mathbb{Z}[2]\oplus \mathbb{Z}[3]\) (\(\mathbb{Z}[p]\) is the the group of \(p\)-adic integers) seen as the profinite closure of its dense subgroup \(\mathbb{Z}\oplus \mathbb{Z}\). The automorphism of \(\mathbb{Z}\oplus \mathbb{Z}\) which swaps the two generators of the infinite cyclic groups \(\mathbb{Z}\) does not extent to a continuous automorphsm of \(\mathbb{Z}[2]\oplus \mathbb{Z}[3]\). The rest of the paper is devoted to the study of the lamplighter group \(\mathcal{L}_{k}=\mathbb{Z}_{k}\wr \mathbb{Z}\) and its automorphism group. The lamplighter group and its automorphsms have been studied extensively in the past. Here, the authors give alternative proofs of a theorem in [\textit{M. Stein} et al., Int. J. Algebra Comput. 25, No. 8, 1275--1299 (2015; Zbl 1342.20037)] and a theorem in [\textit{S. Bachmuth} et al., J. Lond. Math. Soc., II. Ser. 36, No. 3, 393--406 (1987; Zbl 0638.20022)]. Here, they focus on the structure of \(\mathcal{L}_{k}\) as an automaton group of a Cayley machine. For a finite group \(H\), a Cayley machine \(\mathcal{C}_{H}\) and the automaton group \(\mathcal{G}(\mathcal{C}_{H})\) generated by \(\mathcal{C}_{H}\) are defined (see Example 2.2 in the paper) in [\textit{P. V. Silva} and \textit{B. Steinberg}, Int. J. Algebra Comput. 15, No. 5--6, 1213--1234 (2005; Zbl 1106.20028)]) and it is proved that \(\mathcal{G}(\mathcal{C}_{H}) \cong H\wr \mathbb{Z}\). Therefore, for a fixed \(k\geq 2\) we have \(\mathcal{L}_{k}=\mathbb{Z}_{k}\wr \mathbb{Z} \cong \mathcal{G}(\mathcal{C}_{\mathbb{Z}_{k}})\). This consideration of the lamplighter group \(\mathcal{L}_{k}\) allows to study the automorphism group of \(\mathcal{L}_{k}\) in details and finally to prove: Theorem 6.1. Every \(\varphi \in \Aut(\mathcal{L}_{k})\) is uniformly continuous with respect to the depth metric. Already, Lemma 4.1. is proved: Let \(G\leq \Aut(T_{A})\) and \(\vartheta: G \longrightarrow G\) a function. The following conditions are equivalent: \begin{itemize} \item[(i)] \(\vartheta \) admits a continuous extension to \((\bar{G}, d)\); \item[(ii)] \(\vartheta \) is uniformly continuous in \((G, d)\). \end{itemize} These two results yield to Theorem 1.2. Every automorphism of \(\mathcal{L}_{k}\) admits a continuous extension for the depth metric. The paper concludes with two interesting questions.