Permutation Groups Induced by Derksen Groups in Characteristic Two

Abstract

We consider the so-called Derksen group which is a subgroup of the polynomial automorphism group of the polynomial ring in n variables over a field. The Derksen group is generated by affine automorphisms and one particular non-linear automorphism. Derksen (1994) proved that if the characteristic of the underlying field is zero and n ≥ 3, then the Derksen group is equal to the entire tame subgroup. The result is called Derksen’s Theorem. It is quite natural to ask whether the same property holds for positive characteristic. In this paper, we point out that the question can be easily answered negatively when the underlying field is of characteristic two. We shall also prove that the permutation group induced by the Derksen group over a finite field of characteristic two is a proper subgroup of the alternating group on the n-dimensional linear space over the finite field. This is a stronger result that Derksen’s Theorem does not hold when the underlying field is a finite field of characteristic two.