On the Andreadakis-Johnson filtration of the automorphism group of a free group. (Q549990)

In [Proc. Lond. Math. Soc., III. Ser. 15, 239-268 (1965; Zbl 0135.04502)], the reviewer introduced a filtration of the automorphism group \(\Aut(F_n)\) of the free group \(F_n\). This consists of the subgroups of automorphisms \(J^s_n\) (in the present notation) of \(\Aut(F_n)\) which are defined as the subgroups which consist of the automorphisms inducing the identity on the factors \(F_n/\Gamma^{s+1}_n\), where \(\Gamma^{s+1}_n\) denotes here the \((s+1)\)-st term of the lower central series for \(F_n\). In the present paper the authors study cohomology aspects of this filtration. In the authors' words: Methods are (1) to analyze analogous classes for filtrations of a subgroup of the pure symmetric automorphism group of a free group and (2) to analyze features of these classes which are preserved by the Johnson homomorphism with values in the Lie algebra of derivations of a free Lie algebra. One consequence is that the ranks of the cohomology groups in any fixed degree \(i\) for \(1\leq i\leq n-2\) for the Johnson filtrations of \(\text{IA}_n\) increase without bound. One of the main results (without further explanation) is: If \(n\geq 3\), and \(2\leq q\leq n-1\), the integral cohomology ring \(H^*(J^s_n)\) contains a direct summand which is additively isomorphic to \(\bigotimes_{n-q}(\mathbb Z\oplus L_s[V_q]^*)\) in the image of \(\tau^*_s\colon H^*(\Hom(V_n,L_{s+1}[V_n]))\to H^*(J^s_n)\). Thus if \(1\leq i\leq n-2\), then the ranks of \(H^i(J^s_n)\) increase without bound as \(s\) increases. Here \(V_n=V\) is a free Abelian group of rank \(n\), \(L_s[V]=L[V]\cap V^{\otimes s}\), \(L[V]\) the free Lie algebra over the integers \(\mathbb Z\) and \(L_s[V]^*=\Hom(L_s[V],\mathbb Z)\). The methods are similar to those occurring within the theory of arrangements.