Torsion-free abelian groups revisited (Q2039357)

All groups are abelian. The author study the action the automorphism group of a torsion-free group of finite rank \(G\) on the maximal independent subsets of \(G\). It is proved that this action determines the isomorphism classes of indecomposable direct decompositions of \(G\) and strongly indecomposable quasi-decomposition determines an isomorphism class of subgroups of \(G\) of finite index which are direct sums of strongly indecomposable pure subgroups. The author gives a new proof of Lady's theorem: a torsion-free group of finite rank can have only a finite number of non-isomorphic direct summands. The author presents a new characterisation of strongly indecomposable groups.