\(Q\)-transformations and \(Q\)-equivalence (Q5959487)

By a `balanced' code of a group, in this paper, the author means a group \(G=\langle a_1,\dots,a_n\mid R_1,R_2,\dots,R_n\rangle\) generated by \(a_1,a_2,\dots,a_n\) and relations \(R_1,\dots,R_n\). The `Extended Nielsen operations' are the usual Nielsen operations of the set of relations together with conjugations by words in the generators. A \(Q\)-transformation of the code is a finite sequence of extended Nielsen operations. Two codes are called \(Q\)-equivalent if one can be transformed into the other by a \(Q\)-transformation. A \(Q\)-trivialization is a \(Q\)-transformation transforming a code into the trivial code \(\langle a_1,a_2,\dots,a_n\mid a_1,a_2,\dots,a_n\rangle\). It is still open the well known Andrews-Curtis conjecture, that any balanced code of the identity group admits a \(Q\)-trivialization. In this paper the following theorem is proved: Two balanced codes of the identity group are \(Q\)-equivalent if and only if one of them can be transformed to the other by a finite sequence of the following transformations: (1) \(R_i\to R^{-1}_i\) and \(R_k\to R_k\) for \(k\neq i\) (inversion); (2) \(R_i\to WR_i W^{-1}\) and \(R_k\to R_k\) for \(k\neq i\) (conjugation); (3) if a reduced word \(R_i\) is of the form \(RR_j\), \(i\neq j\), and if \(R\) is cyclically reduced, then \(R_i\to R\) and \(R_k \to R_k\) for \(k\neq i\) (truncation). The proof is purely combinatorial.