Subgroup growth in some pro-\(p\) groups (Q2759009)

This paper considers the subgroup structure of certain pro-\(p\) groups. Let \(\Lambda\) be a local ring with maximal ideal \(M\). We define NEWLINE\[NEWLINE\text{SL}_d^1(\Lambda)=\ker(\text{SL}_d(\Lambda)\to\text{SL}_d(\Lambda/M)).NEWLINE\]NEWLINE The cases considered are \(\Lambda=\mathbb{Z}_p\), the \(p\)-adic integers, and \(\Lambda=\mathbb{F}_p[[t]]\), the formal power series over a field of \(p\) elements.NEWLINENEWLINENEWLINEFor a group \(G\), let \(a_n(G)\) denote the number of subgroups of index \(n\). The authors consider the following question of \textit{A. Mann}'s: What is the supremum of the numbers \(c\), such that if \(G\) is a pro-\(p\) group and \(a_n(G)<n^{c\log_pn}\) for all large \(n\), then \(G\) is \(p\)-adic analytic? [Prog. Math. 184, 233-247 (2000; Zbl 0974.20023)]. A result of \textit{A. Shalev} says that the result is at least 1/8, [J. Lond. Math. Soc., II. Ser. 46, No. 1, 111-122 (1992; Zbl 0765.20012)]. By considering the subgroup structure of \(\text{SL}_2^1(\mathbb{F}_p[[t]])\) for \(p>2\) the authors prove that the supremum is no more than 1/2. In particular, they prove that the number of subgroups of \(\text{SL}_2^1(\mathbb{F}_p[[t]])\) of index \(p^k\) is bounded by \(p^{k(k+5)/2}\).NEWLINENEWLINENEWLINEThe authors also consider \(b_n(G)\), the number of normal subgroups of index \(n\) of a group \(G\). For \(\Lambda=\mathbb{F}_p[[t]]\) with \(p\) not dividing \(d\), or \(\Lambda=\mathbb{Z}_p\) and \(p\neq 2\) or \(d\neq 2\), they show that the normal subgroup structure of \(\text{SL}_2^1(\Lambda)\) is eventually periodic, i.e. \(b_{p^k}=b_{p^k+d^2-1}\) for all \(k>K\) where \(K\) is a constant dependent on \(p\) and \(d\). The authors note that this is similar to the case of the Nottingham group \(J_p\) which has the following periodic normal group structure for \(p\geq 3\): \(b_{p^k}(J_p)=p+1\) when \(k\equiv 1\bmod p\) and \(b_{p^k}(J_p)=1\) otherwise [\textit{I. O. York}, The group of formal power series under substitution, Ph.D. Thesis, Nottingham (1990)]. However, they show that \(b_n(\text{SL}_d^1(\mathbb{F}_p[[t]]))\) is not bounded as a function of \(n\) when \(p\) divides \(d\).NEWLINENEWLINENEWLINEThe authors use Lie methods to prove their results.