Endomorphisms of profinite groups. (Q399429)

Let \(G\) be a profinite group with the property that \(G\) has finitely many open subgroups of index \(n\) for every integer \(n\) and let \(\varphi\) be a continuous endomorphism of \(G\). The author shows that \(G\) has a semidirect decomposition into a contracting normal subgroup and a complement on which \(\varphi\) induces an automorphism. More precisely \(\text{Con}(\varphi)=\{x\in G\mid\lim_{n\to\infty}\varphi^n(x)=1\}\) and \(\Phi_+(G)=\bigcap_{n\geq 0}\varphi^n(G)\) are closed subgroups of \(G\), \(G=\text{Con}(\varphi)\rtimes\Phi_+(G)\), the restriction of \(\varphi\) to \(\Phi_+(G)\) is an automorphism and \(\varphi^k(\text{Con}(\varphi))=\text{Con}(\varphi)\cap\varphi^k(G)\) for all \(k\geq 0\). In the particular case when \(\varphi\) is an injective endomorphism whose image is open in \(G\), \(\text{Con}(\varphi)\) is an open subgroup of a direct product of finitely many uniform pro-\(p\)-groups that are nilpotent and a residually nilpotent soluble group of finite exponent.NEWLINENEWLINE This has the following significative corollary: if there is a proper open subgroup of \(G\) that is isomorphic to \(G\) itself, then there exists a prime number \(p\) such that \(G\) contains an infinite Abelian pro-\(p\) normal subgroup.