A surprising isomorphism (Q583368)

The group \(G=4^+(a^{12})\) [\textit{N. Biggs}, Computational group theory, Durham 1982, 57-63 (1984; Zbl 0546.05031)] arose from the study of the automorphism group of trivalent symmetric graphs. It has the presentation \[ <a,b,c| \quad c^ 2=(ca)^ 2=(cb)^ 2=(a^{- 1}b)^ 2=(a^{-2}b^ 2)^ 2=a^{12}=1,\quad a^ 3b^{-3}a^ 3=bab,\quad a^ 3bca^ 4=ba^ 2b>. \] The main result of this paper shows that G is a split extension \(SL(3,{\mathbb{Z}}).<d>\), where \(d\in Aut(SL(3,{\mathbb{Z}}))\), \(d(A)=(A^{-1})^*\). This enables to find explicit forms of finite presentations for the groups SL(3,\({\mathbb{Z}})\) and SL(3,\({\mathbb{Z}};2{\mathbb{Z}})\).