Weak Tits alternative for groups acting geometrically on buildings (Q6568818)

The Tits alternative is a dichotomy for groups and their subgroups, first formally defined by \textit{H. Bass} and \textit{A. Lubotzky} [Isr. J. Math. 44, 1--22 (1983; Zbl 0517.14015)] but whose initial study dates back to the work of \textit{J. Tits} [J. Algebra 20, 250--270 (1972; Zbl 0236.20032)] where it was shown that every finitely generated linear group is either virtually solvable or contains the free group \(F_{2}\) as a subgroup. A class of groups \(\mathcal{C}\) satisfies the weak Tits alternative if every \(G \in \mathcal{C}\) is either virtually abelian or contains \(F_{2}\) as a subgroup. The weak Tits alternative has been shown to be satisfied for groups acting properly and co-compactly on Euclidean buildings (see [\textit{W. Ballmann} and \textit{M. Brin}, Publ. Math., Inst. Hautes Étud. Sci. 82, 169--209 (1995; Zbl 0866.53029)]).\N\NThe main result in this paper is (Theorem A): The class of groups acting properly and co-compactly (i.e. geometrically) by type-preserving automorphisms on a building satisfies the weak Tits alternative.\N\NTheorem A follows from Theorem B (due to P. E. Caprace), a more general result on the weak Tits alternative for groups acting geometrically on products of \(\mathrm{CAT}(0)\) spaces satisfying rank rigidity. In the appendix, the authors outline a proof of Theorem B and they show how Theorem B implies Theorem A.