Cubic core-free symmetric m-Cayley graphs

A graph is called a Cayley graph (or bi-Cayley graph, respectively) of a group G if it has a group G of automorphisms acting semiregularly on the vertices with exactly one orbit (or two orbits, respectively). It is known every Cayley graph is vertex-transitive. In this paper, we first present a classification of connected cubic non-Cayley vertex-transitive bi-Cayley graphs of a finite p-group H, where p > 3 is a prime and the derived subgroup of H is either cyclic or isomorphic to Zp × Zp. This is then used to give a classification of connected cubic non-Cayley vertex-transitive graphs of order 2p4 for each prime p.

2-Arc-transitive Cayley graphs on alternating groups

Throughout this note, G will be a finite group, IrrðGÞ will be the set of irreducible characters of G, cdðGÞ will be the set of character degrees of G, and rðGÞ will be the set of primes that divide degrees in cdðGÞ. The prime vertex degree graph of G, written DðGÞ, is the graph with rðGÞ as its vertex set, and with an edge between p and q if pq divides some degree a A cdðGÞ. An overview of the literature on these graphs can be found in [2]. It seems that most groups G have graphs DðGÞ that are complete graphs (although we do not want to be precise on what we mean by ‘most’). For solvable groups, it has been shown that if DðGÞ is not complete, then the structure of G is limited (see [4] and [6]). In this note, we show that a large class of non-solvable groups have degree graphs that are complete. To study the degree graphs of non-solvable groups, a standard starting point is with the degree graphs of non-abelian simple groups. In a series of papers, Don White has classified the character degree graphs of all non-abelian simple groups. Except for some examples of small rank, nearly all non-abelian simple groups have degree graphs that are complete graphs. These results are summarized in [5]. Extending this idea, this note looks at the characteristically simple groups, groups for which there are exactly two characteristic subgroups. Each such group is a direct product of copies of a fixed simple group. With this in mind, we let G denote G G (n copies); thus S is characteristically simple when S itself is a simple group. We now fix S to be a non-abelian simple group. Because the non-abelian simple groups have already been addressed, we restrict our attention to when n > 1. However, it is relatively easy to show that DðSÞ is complete for n > 1. More generally, the graph DðHÞ associated with any non-abelian group H is always complete for every integer n > 1. Thus we expand our scope and consider extending these groups. We recognize first that S is isomorphic to InnðSÞ. Identifying S with its set of inner automorphisms, our goal herein is to prove the following result.

Symmetric graphs of valency five and their basic normal quotients

Let be a finite connected cubic -arc-transitive graph, where is a nonabelian simple group. Let be an odd prime, and . Then there exists a normal cover of with and the covering transformation group .

A Cayley snark is a cubic Cayley graph which is not 3-edge-colourable. In the paper we discuss the problem of the existence of Cayley snarks. This problem is closely related to the problem of the existence of non-hamiltonian Cayley graphs and to the question whether every Cayley graph admits a nowhere-zero 4-flow. So far, no Cayley snarks have been found. On the other hand, we prove that the smallest example of a Cayley snark, if it exists, comes either from a non-abelian simple group or from a group which has a single non-trivial proper normal subgroup. The subgroup must have index two and must be either non-abelian simple or the direct product of two isomorphic non-abelian simple groups.

On the extendability of Bi-Cayley graphs of finite abelian groups

ABSTRACTA graph is said to be a semi-Cayley graph over a group G if it admits G as a semiregular automorphism group with two orbits of equal size. In this paper, definition of normal edge-transitive, arc-transitive and -arc-transitive semi-Cayley graphs are given. The main properties of such semi-Cayley graphs are shown and a condition for a graph to be a normal edge-transitive, arc-transitive, or -arc-transitive semi-Cayley will be presented.

Let G be a nonabelian group and associate a noncommuting graph ∇(G) with G as follows: The vertex set of ∇(G) is G\\Z(G) with two vertices x and y joined by an edge whenever the commutator of x and y is not the identity. In 1987, Professor J. G. Thompson gave the following conjecture. Thompson's Conjecture. If G is a finite group with Z(G) = 1 and M is a nonabelian simple group satisfying N(G) = N(M), then G ≅ M, where N(G):={n ∈ ℕ | G has a conjugacy class of size n}. In 2006, A. Abdollahi, S. Akbari, and H. R. Maimani put forward a conjecture (AAM's conjecture) in Abdollahi et al. (2006) as follows. AAM's Conjecture. Let M be a finite nonabelian simple group and G a group such that ∇(G) ≅ ∇ (M). Then G ≅ M. In this short article we prove that if G is a finite group with ∇(G) ≅ ∇ (A 10), then G ≅ A 10, where A 10 is the alternating group of degree 10.

Integral Cayley graphs over dicyclic group

Symmetric graphs of valency 4 having a quasi-semiregular automorphism

It has been proved by Frohlich [1] that the collection of inner automorphisms of a finite simple non-abelian group G generates the group (under pointwise multiplication) of all functions from G into G leaving the identity fixed, and, conversely, that the only finite groups with this property are the simple non-abelian groups, Z2, and [e]. It follows directly that the inner automorphisms and the constant functions of a simple non-abelian group into itself generate the entire group of functions from G into G. The purpose of this note is to prove the following generalization of this theorem.

The workshop Permutation groups organised by Robert Guralnick (Southern California), Cheryl Praeger (Western Australia), Jan Saxl (Cambridge) and Katrin Tent (Bielefeld) was held August 5th–11th, 2007. The focus was recent developments in permutation group theory and their influence on, and from, group representation theory, algebraic graph theory and other areas of geometry and combinatorics, algebraic geometry, model theory and infinite symmetrical structures. It was well attended with 50 participants. Especially valuable was the program to support young researchers which gave the opportunity for a considerable number of young mathematicians to participate in the workshop. They benefited from the ‘Oberwolfach experience’ and also enlivened and contributed enormously to the success of the meeting. The workshop had a friendly and vibrant atmosphere, aided by the excellent facilities of the Institute. All participants appreciated the beautiful lecture by John G. Thompson entitled ‘The divisor matrix and {\rm SL}(2,\Z) ’. (In fact, this meeting was the first Oberwolfach workshop in over twenty years that Thompson had attended.) There were 26 other talks, and the program featured in each of the first five sessions at least one talk by a student or young researcher at the beginning of their career. This facilitated interaction between younger and more established researchers. The number of talks was restricted to give plenty of time for discussion and cooperation among the participants. Other communications were presented as posters. Highlights of the workshop addressed both fundamental permutation group theory, and also significant outcomes from applying permutation group theory and methods in combinatorics, model theory and other areas. Some topics arose in more than one context, forming new connections. A common feature of many contributions was application of the finite simple group classification, or new results on the structure of simple groups. As examples, we mention two highlights reported by early career participants. The question of base size of permutation actions is of importance in computational group theory as well as in the study of the graph isomorphism problem. Recent research has thrown much light on the base sizes of actions of almost simple groups in particular. Burness reported on the very recent proof of a conjecture of Cameron and Kantor dating from 1993 concerning non-standard permutation actions of almost simple groups: these are all primitive actions apart from actions of alternating and symmetric groups on subsets or partitions, and of classical groups on subspaces or pairs of complementary subspaces. In all the latter families the minimum base size is unbounded as the group order increases. The somewhat surprising conjecture, now proved, is that the minimum base size of non-standard permutation groups is at most 7, with the unique example where this bound is attained being the Mathieu group M_{24} in its natural action on 24 points. Expander graphs play an important role in computer science and combinatorics, and, for example, are significant in modelling and analysing communication networks. In particular, their diameters grow only logarithmically with the numbers of vertices. This property on diameters was proved in 1989 by Babai, Kantor and Lubotzky to hold for suitable Cayley graphs of simple groups: specifically for each finite nonabelian simple group G , they constructed a valency 7 Cayley graph for G with diameter at most a constant times \log(|G|) . Although their graphs were not expanders, they conjectured that there exists an absolute constant k such that all infinite families of simple groups give rise to families of valency k Cayley graphs that are expanders. Kassabov lectured on amazing progress towards proving this conjecture – it is now proved for all simple groups apart from the Suzuki groups. It was a very happy and successful workshop. Indeed, several of the most distinguished participants commented that this was one of the best Oberwolfach meetings they had attended, with plenty of time for collaboration, and outstanding talks. Extended abstracts of the talks mentioned, as well as all the others, are given below (in the order in which they were presented).

Let G be a finite nonabelian group and associate a disoriented noncommuting graph ∇(G) with G as follows: the vertex set of ∇(G) is G\Z(G) with two vertices x and y joined by an edge whenever the commutator of x and y is not the identity. In 1987, J. G. Thompson gave the following conjecture.Thompson's Conjecture If G is a finite group with Z(G) = 1 and M is a nonabelian simple group satisfying N(G) = N(M), then G ≅ M, where N(G) denotes the set of the sizes of the conjugacy classes of G.In 2006, A. Abdollahi, S. Akbari and H. R. Maimani put forward a conjecture in [1] as follows.AAM's Conjecture Let M be a finite nonabelian simple group and G a group such that ∇(G)≅ ∇ (M). Then G ≅ M.Even though both of the two conjectures are known to be true for all finite simple groups with nonconnected prime graphs, it is still unknown for almost all simple groups with connected prime graphs. In the present paper, we prove that the second conjecture is true for the projective special unitary simple group U4(7).

In 2004, Fang, Lu, Wang and Xu proved that, with few exceptions, connected Cayley digraphs of finite nonabelian simple groups with out-valency two are normal, enabling a complete determination of the automorphism groups of such Cayley digraphs. In this paper, we present significant improvements: we not only reduce the list of exceptions but also extend these results to the more general setting of products of nonabelian simple groups. This includes the case of nonabelian characteristically simple groups, which is crucial in Praeger’s approach to analyzing the automorphism group of a general Cayley digraph.