On torsion in finitely presented groups. (Q2249562)

The well-known embedding theorem of Higman shows that every recursively presented group can be uniformly embedded in a finitely presented group. As a result, there is a universal finitely presented group containing every other finitely presented group. In this paper, the author gives a new proof (algebraic) for a theorem of Oleg Belegradek which says that there exists a universal finitely presented torsion-free group. It is also proved that for a set of natural numbers \(A\), the following statements are equivalent: (1) For some f.p. group \(G\), \(A\) is the set of orders of torsion elements of \(G\). (2) For some countably generated recursively presented group \(G\), \(A\) is the set of orders of torsion elements of \(G\). (3) \(A\) is a factor-complete \(\Sigma^0_2\)-set (in Kleene's arithmetic hierarchy).