On spherical unitary representations of groups of spheromorphisms of Bruhat-Tits trees (Q2076053)

Summary: Consider an infinite homogeneous tree \(\mathcal{T}_n\) of valence \(n+1\), its group \(\mathrm{Aut} (\mathcal{T}_n)\) of automorphisms, and the group \(\mathrm{Hier} (\mathcal{T}_n)\) of its spheromorphisms (hierarchomorphisms), i.e., the group of homeomorphisms of the boundary of \(\mathcal{T}_n\) that locally coincide with transformations defined by automorphisms. We show that the subgroup \(\mathrm{Aut} (\mathcal{T}_n)\) is spherical in \(\mathrm{Hier}(\mathcal{T}_n)\), i.e., any irreducible unitary representation of \(\mathrm{Hier} (\mathcal{T}_n)\) contains at most one \(\mathrm{Aut}(\mathcal{T}_n)\)-fixed vector. We present a combinatorial description of the space of double cosets of \(\mathrm{Hier} (\mathcal{T}_n)\) with respect to \(\mathrm{Aut}(\mathcal{T}_n)\) and construct a ``new'' family of spherical representations of \(\mathrm{Hier} (\mathcal{T}_n)\). We also show that the Thompson group Th has \(\mathrm{PSL}(2,\mathbb{Z})\)-spherical unitary representations.