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Trivial group
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This article is about a basic definition in group theory.The article text may, however, contain advanced material.
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This article is about a particular group, viz a group unique upto isomorphism[SHOW MORE]
Definition
Verbal definition
The trivial group is the group with only one element, which is its identity element. The trivial group is usually denoted as 1, {1}, or {e}.
Alternative definitions
- The cyclic group on one element
- The symmetric group on one element
- The projective general linear group of order 1 over any field
- The special linear group of order 1 over any field
- The general linear group GL(1,2)
- The orthogonal group of order 1 over a field of characteristic two
Multiplication table
| Element | e (identity element) |
|---|---|
| e | e |
Importance
The trivial group is important in the following ways:
- For any group, there is a unique homomorphism from the trivial group to that group, namely the homomorphism sending it to the identity element. Thus, the trivial group occurs in a unique way as a subgroup for any given group, namely the one-element subgroup comprising the identity element. This is termed the trivial subgroup.
- For any group, there is a unique homomorphism to the trivial group from that group, namely the homomorphism sending everything to the identity element. Thus, the trivial group occurs in a unique way as a quotient group of any given group, namely its quotient by itself. This is termed the trivial quotient.
Arithmetic functions
| Function | Value | Explanation |
|---|---|---|
| order | 1 | only the identity element. |
| exponent | 1 | |
| nilpotency class | 0 | |
| derived length | 0 | |
| Frattini length | 0 | |
| Fitting length | 0 | |
| minimum size of generating set | 0 | |
| subgroup rank of a group | 0 |
Group properties
| Property | Satisfied | Explanation |
|---|---|---|
| cyclic group | Yes | |
| abelian group | Yes | |
| nilpotent group | Yes | |
| solvable group | Yes | |
| perfect group | Yes |
GAP implementation
Group ID
This finite group has order 1 and has ID 1 among the group of order 1 in GAP's SmallGroup library. It can thus be defined using GAP's SmallGroup function as:
SmallGroup(1,1)
For instance, we can use the following assignment in GAP to create the group and name it G:
gap> G := SmallGroup(1,1);
Other descriptions
The group can be defined using the TrivialGroup function:
TrivialGroup

