Triangles in the graph of conjugacy classes of normal subgroups (Q504107)

For many years, mathematicians have considered the correspondence between the arithmetical data given by the conjugacy class sizes of a finite group and the algebraic structure of the group. In this paper, the authors take a slightly different approach and instead consider the conjugacy classes of a normal subgroup \(N\) of a finite group \(G\). They define the graph \(\Gamma_G(N)\) to have as vertices the non-central \(G\)-classes of \(N\) and join two vertices if the class sizes are not coprime. Note, this graph is a subgraph of the usual graph \(\Gamma(G)\) (where the vertices are all non-central conjugacy classes of \(G\) and the rule for the edges is as before), but is not naturally related to \(\Gamma(N)\). \textit{M. Fang} and \textit{P. Zhang} [J. Algebra 264, No. 2, 613--619 (2003; Zbl 1024.20021)] have given a complete list of all finite groups \(G\) such that \(\Gamma(G)\) has no triangles. In this paper, the authors determine the structure of \(N\) when \(\Gamma_G(N)\) has no triangles and when the graph consists of exactly one triangle. To do this they first consider when the graph has 1, 2 or 3 vertices. This is a nicely written paper with examples given to demonstrate all cases can occur.