The Donald-Flanigan problem for finite reflection groups (Q5945523)

The paper under review is a new contribution to a very interesting problem. Let \(k\) be a field; if \(G\) is a finite group whose order is not a multiple of the characteristic of the field \(k\), then the group algebra \(kG\) is separable. If \(\text{char }k\) does divide \(|G|\), Donald and Flanigan conjectured in 1974 that there exists a separable deformation of \(kG\). Some years later, this conjecture became the so-called ``Donald-Flanigan problem''. M. Schaps conjectured that the matrix blocks of the deformed algebra should be in one-to-one correspondence with those in characteristic 0 and that the dimension of each block should be equal to the dimension of the corresponding block in characteristic 0. This problem has already been solved in various situations (generally with a positive answer, sometimes with a negative one); a detailed bibliography is given at the end of the paper. The needed background in algebraic deformation theory is largely given in the first sections, together with examples. Global solutions, split global solutions and local solutions for the Donald-Flanigan problem are defined. Then a global solution of the problem is developed for finite Abelian groups and dihedral groups. The biggest part of the paper is devoted to more complicated constructions. From the abstract: ``We determine the structure of a wreath product of a group \(H\) with a sum of central separable algebras and show that if there is a solution for \(H\) over \(k\) which is a sum of central separable algebras and if \({\mathcal S}_n\) is the symmetric group then: (i) The problem is solvable also for the wreath product \(H\wr{\mathcal S}_n=H\times\cdots\times H\text{ (}n\) times)