Character separation and principal covering. (Q536016)

The authors investigate the separation of ordinary irreducible characters by blocks at different primes and the covering of ordinary irreducible characters by blocks. Suppose \(G\) is a finite group and \(\pi_1\) and \(\pi_2\) are two disjoint sets of primes whose union is the set of all prime divisors of \(|G|\). The authors prove that \(\mathrm{Irr}(B_0(G)_p)\cap\mathrm{Irr}(B_0(G)_q)=\{1_G\}\) for any prime \(p\in\pi_1\) and \(q\in\pi_2\) if and only if \(G=O_{\pi_1}(G)\times O_{\pi_2}(G)\). This generalizes a result of the authors [\textit{C. Bessenrodt} and \textit{J. Zhang}, Adv. Math. 218, No. 2, 485-495 (2008; Zbl 1185.20009)] and provides a criterion for the \(p\)-nilpotency of finite groups. The main result of the paper under review is about principal coverings. A finite group \(G\) is said to be principally covered if every \(\chi\in\mathrm{Irr}(G)\) lies in \(B_0(G)_p\) for some prime \(p\), and \(G\) is said to be strongly principally covered if any two ordinary irreducible characters of \(G\) belong to the same principal \(p\)-block for some prime \(p\). The authors prove that if \(G\) is principally covered then \(\mathrm{Irr}(G)=\mathrm{Irr}(B_0(G)_p)\) for some prime \(p\), or the generalized Fitting subgroup \(F^*(G)\) is either non-Abelian simple or isomorphic to an explicit list of groups each of which is a direct product of two simple groups. They also prove that if \(G\) is strongly principally covered then \(\mathrm{Irr}(G)=\mathrm{Irr}(B_0(G)_p)\) for some prime \(p\), or \(F^*(G)\) is isomorphic to one of 19 explicitly given simple groups. Note that the groups with \(\mathrm{Irr}(G)=\mathrm{Irr}(B_0(G)_p)\) have been characterized by \textit{M. E. Harris} [in J. Algebra 94, 411-424 (1985; Zbl 0602.20013)].