Symmetric automorphisms of free groups, BNSR-invariants, and finiteness properties

Abstract: The BNSR-invariants of a group

G

are a sequence

S i g m a^{1} (G) s u p s e t e q S i g m a^{2} (G) s u p s e t e q c d o t s

of geometric invariants that reveal important information about finiteness properties of certain subgroups of

G

. We consider the symmetric automorphism group

S i g m a A u t_{n}

and pure symmetric automorphism group

P S i g m a A u t_{n}

of the free group

F_{n}

, and inspect their BNSR-invariants. We prove that for

n g e 2

, all the ``positive and ``negative character classes of

P S i g m a A u t_{n}

lie in

S i g m a^{n - 2} (P S i g m a A u t_{n}) s e t m i n u s S i g m a^{n - 1} (P S i g m a A u t_{n})

. We use this to prove that for

n g e 2

,

S i g m a^{n - 2} (S i g m a A u t_{n})

equals the full character sphere

S^{0}

of

S i g m a A u t_{n}

but

S i g m a^{n - 1} (S i g m a A u t_{n})

is empty, so in particular the commutator subgroup

S i g m a A u {t_{n}}^{'}

is of type

F_{n - 2}

but not

F_{n - 1}

. Our techniques involve applying Morse theory to the complex of symmetric marked cactus graphs.

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