More Abelian groups with free duals. (Q2428730)

The author considers subgroups \(G\) of the Baer Specker group \(\mathbb Z^\omega\) and their duals \(\Hom(G,\mathbb Z)\). It is well known that the dual of the Baer Specker group itself is the free group of countable infinite rank while the latter has the Baer Specker group as its dual. Since the Baer Specker group has size the continuum it is natural to ask for subgroups that have large free duals. The author constructs in a very nice and tricky way subgroups of \(\mathbb Z^\omega\) that have the free group of rank \(2^{\aleph_0}\) as their dual group. This answers a question by Blass, Irwin and Schlitt. Moreover, the question of whether \(\mathbb Z^\omega\) has subgroups whose duals are free of even higher rank than \(2^{\aleph_0}\) is discussed and some further interesting classes of subgroups of \(\mathbb Z^\omega\) are explored. The paper is well-written and the author explains nicely how he obtained his results explaining the failures.