No label defined (Q4946828)

This is a survey of results and problems in the theory of (finite) \(p\)-groups, that is, finite groups whose order is a power of a prime \(p\). The author, a leading expert in the field, writes: ``Why consider these groups? Personally I find them fascinating, but that opinion is not shared by everyone.'' It is difficult to think of something more effective than the present paper to influence (in positive!) one's opinion about the subject. We warmly recommend this very readable paper, of which the present review can only give a very rough idea. The paper begins with an overview of enumeration questions, including that tricky one: ``Is it true that most \(p\)-groups are of [nilpotency] class 2?'' It covers among others the spectacular recent result of \textit{M. du Sautoy} [Electron. Res. Announc. Am. Math. Soc. 5, No. 16, 112-122 (1999)] to the effect that a certain function counting \(p\)-groups satisfies a linear recurrence relation with constant coefficients. A section on automorphisms follows. Automorphisms of \(p\)-groups have many fascinating properties. On the one hand, `most' \(p\)-groups have a \(p\)-group as automorphism group [\textit{U. Martin}, Bull. Am. Math. Soc., New Ser. 15, 78-82 (1986; Zbl 0599.20032)]. However, given any subgroup \(H\) of the general linear group in dimension \(n\) over the field with \(p\) elements, there is a \(p\)-group \(G\) in \(n\) generators so that the group of automorphisms induced on the Frattini factor group of \(G\) is isomorphic to \(H\) [\textit{R. M. Bryant} and \textit{L. G. Kovács}, J. Lond. Math. Soc., II. Ser. 17, 415-421 (1978; Zbl 0384.20017)]. The section on structural questions starts from the seminal work of \textit{C. R. Leedham-Green} and \textit{M. F. Newman} [Arch. Math. 35, 193-202 (1980; Zbl 0437.20016)] on the coclass conjectures, and goes on to discuss many intriguing questions. The final section deals with characters and conjugacy classes, and asks among others for a characterization of \(2\)-groups all of whose characters are rational (real) valued, other than the direct one in terms of conjugates of elements.