Embeddings into groups with only a few defining relations

Abstract

It is a trivial consequence of Magnus' solution to the word problem for one-relator groups [9] and the existence of finitely presented groups with unsolvable word problem [4] that not every finitely presented group can be embedded in a one-relator group. We modify a construction of Aanderaa [1] to show that any finitely presented group can be embedded in a group with twenty-six defining relations. It then follows from the well-known theorem of Higman [7] that there is a fixed group with twenty-six defining relations in which every recursively presented group is embedded.