Mapping tori with first Betti number at least two (Q2370104)

A finitely presented group \(G\) whose Abelianization contains \(\mathbb{Z}\oplus\mathbb{Z}\) as a summand (that is, has first Betti number \(\beta_1(G)\geq 2\)) clearly admits a large family of surjective homomorphisms \(\phi: G\to\mathbb{Z}\) onto the integers \(\mathbb{Z}\). The author's main result states that the homomorphism \(\phi\) can be chosen so that the kernel \(K\) of \(\phi\) is finitely generated with first Betti number \(\beta_1(K)\) arbitrarily large, provided that the Alexander polynomial of \(G\) is nonconstant. The proof involves the Bieri-Neumann-Strebel invariant of a finitely generated group. The result provides many examples of the known facts that, both in the algebraic and the topological cases, the fiber in a mapping torus construction of a group \(G\) or space \(X\) can be highly nonunique. The resulting examples are of particular interest in the study 3-manifolds that fiber over a circle. The author answers or gives the status of a number of the questions raised by \textit{W. D. Neumann} in his paper [Math. Sci. 4, 143--148 (1979; Zbl 0414.20030)].