Groups with boundedly many commutators of maximal order (Q2214129)

Let \(G\) be a group. It was proved by \textit{W. Cocke} and \textit{G. Venkataraman} [Am. Math. Mon. 126, No. 1, 66--69 (2019; Zbl 1406.20030)] that if \(G\) contains \(m\) elements of maximal order (here \(1\leq m<\infty\)), then \(G\) is finite and its order can be bounded by a function of \(m\) (a short proof of this result is given in the paper under review). Using this result as a reference point, the aim of the authors is to study the structure of groups in which there are finitely many commutators whose order is maximal among all commutators. It is for instance proved that if a group contains a commutator of infinite order, then there must be infinitely many such commutators (Lemma 2.1), so it possible to assume that the order of those (finitely many) commutators of maximal order is finite. In such circumstances and under the additional hypothesis of residually finiteness, the authors show that these groups are almost abelian, and even with a finite commutator subgroup if they are finitely generated (Proposition 2.3). Other results concern the existence of a normal subgroup such that both its index in the whole group and the order of its commutator subgroup are bounded in terms of the number of commutators having maximal order. Some further information about groups with finitely many elements of maximal order is given. Finally, it should be noticed that many arguments rely on well-known properties and results on groups with finite conjugacy classes.