On the Finiteness Property for Rational Matrices

We analyze the periodicity of optimal long products of matrices. A set of matrices is said to have the finiteness property if the maximal rate of growth of long products of matrices taken from the set can be obtained by a periodic product. It was conjectured a decade ago that all finite sets of real matrices have the finiteness property. This conjecture, known as the ``finiteness conjecture", is now known to be false but no explicit counterexample to the conjecture is available and in particular it is unclear if a counterexample is possible whose matrices have rational or binary entries. In this paper, we prove that finite sets of nonnegative rational matrices have the finiteness property if and only if \emph{pairs} of \emph{binary} matrices do. We also show that all {pairs} of $2 \times 2$ binary matrices have the finiteness property. These results have direct implications for the stability problem for sets of matrices. Stability is algorithmically decidable for sets of matrices that have the finiteness property and so it follows from our results that if all pairs of binary matrices have the finiteness property then stability is decidable for sets of nonnegative rational matrices. This would be in sharp contrast with the fact that the related problem of boundedness is known to be undecidable for sets of nonnegative rational matrices.Comment: 12 pages, 1 figur

Subdirect products of groups and the n-(n+1)-(n+2) Conjecture

We analyse the subgroup structure of direct products of groups. Earlier work on this topic has revealed that higher finiteness properties play a crucial role in determining which groups appear as subgroups of direct products of free groups or limit groups. Here, we seek to relate the finiteness properties of a subgroup to the way it is embedded in the ambient product. To this end we formulate a conjecture on finiteness properties of fibre products of groups. We present different approaches to this conjecture, proving a general result on finite generation of homology groups of fibre products and, for certain special cases, results on the stronger finiteness properties F_n and FP_n.Comment: 32 page

Abels's groups revisited

We generalize a class of groups introduced by Herbert Abels to produce examples of virtually torsion free groups that have Bredon-finiteness length m-1 and classical finiteness length n-1 for all 0 < m <= n. The proof illustrates how Bredon-finiteness properties can be verified using geometric methods and a version of Brown's criterion due to Martin Fluch and the author.Comment: 17 pages, 2 figures, v2 more detaile

An explicit counterexample to the Lagarias-Wang finiteness conjecture

The joint spectral radius of a finite set of real $d \times d$ matrices is defined to be the maximum possible exponential rate of growth of long products of matrices drawn from that set. A set of matrices is said to have the \emph{finiteness property} if there exists a periodic product which achieves this maximal rate of growth. J.C. Lagarias and Y. Wang conjectured in 1995 that every finite set of real $d \times d$ matrices satisfies the finiteness property. However, T. Bousch and J. Mairesse proved in 2002 that counterexamples to the finiteness conjecture exist, showing in particular that there exists a family of pairs of $2 \times 2$ matrices which contains a counterexample. Similar results were subsequently given by V.D. Blondel, J. Theys and A.A. Vladimirov and by V.S. Kozyakin, but no explicit counterexample to the finiteness conjecture has so far been given. The purpose of this paper is to resolve this issue by giving the first completely explicit description of a counterexample to the Lagarias-Wang finiteness conjecture. Namely, for the set \mathsf{A}_{\alpha_*}:= \{({cc}1&1\\0&1), \alpha_*({cc}1&0\\1&1)\} we give an explicit value of \alpha_* \simeq 0.749326546330367557943961948091344672091327370236064317358024...] such that $\mathsf{A}_{\alpha_*}$ does not satisfy the finiteness property.Comment: 27 pages, 2 figure