The Andreadakis problem for the McCool groups (Q7320210)

The Andreadakis problem asks, for a group \(G\) and its automorphism group \(\mathrm{Aut}(G)\), whether the lower central series \(\Gamma_k\) of the IA-automorphism subgroup coincides with the Andreadakis-Johnson filtration \(\mathcal{A}_k\). The paper proves that the McCool group \(\mathrm{P}\Sigma_n\) of basis-conjugating automorphisms of the free group \(F_n\) does not satisfy this equality for any \(n \geq 3\): the quotient \((\mathcal{A}_7(F_n) \cap \mathrm{P}\Sigma_n)/\Gamma_7(\mathrm{P}\Sigma_n)\) has a central subgroup which is free abelian of rank \(\binom{n}{3}\). As a consequence, the Andreadakis problem for \(\mathrm{P}\Sigma_n\) does not stabilize, in contrast to the free group case.\N\NExplicit computer computations of \(\kappa_k(\mathrm{P}\Sigma_3) \otimes \mathbb{Q}\) for \(k \leq 9\) are also given.