Combins of Semidrect Products and 3-Manifold Groups.
We give a new method to compute the centralizer of an element in Artin braid groups and, more generally, in Garside groups. This method, together with the solution of the conjugacy problem given by the authors in [9], are two main steps for solving conjugacy systems, thus breaking recently discovered cryptosystems based in braid groups [2]. We also present the result of our computations, where we notice that our algorithm yields surprisingly small generating sets for the centralizers.
If G is a countable group containing a copy of F₂ then the conjugacy equivalence relation on subgroups of G attains the maximal possible complexity.
Here we consider two classes of torsion-free one-relator groups which have proved quite amenable to study-the cyclically pinched one-relator groups and the conjugacy pinched one-relator groups. The former is the class of groups which are free products of free groups with cyclic amalgamations while the latter is the class of HNN extensions of free groups with cyclic associated subgroups. Both are generalizations of surface groups. We compare and contrast results in these classes relative to n-freeness,...
We introduce the notion of a critical constant for recurrence of random walks on -spaces. For a subgroup of a finitely generated group the critical constant is an asymptotic invariant of the quotient -space . We show that for any infinite -space . We say that is very small if . For a normal subgroup the quotient space is very small if and only if it is finite. However, we give examples of infinite very small -spaces. We show also that critical constants for recurrence can be used...