Sylow number
Contents
Definition
Definition with symbols
Let be a finite group and
a prime dividing the order of
. Then the Sylow number for
, denoted as
, is any of the following equivalent values:
- The number of
-Sylow subgroups
- The index of the normalizer of any
-Sylow subgroup
Equivalence of definitions
Further information: Sylow number equals index of Sylow normalizer
The equivalence of definitions follows from the fact that any two -Sylow subgroups are conjugate.
Facts
It divides the index of the Sylow subgroup
Further information: Divisibility condition on Sylow numbers
Let be the index of the Sylow subgroup. Then
divides
. The easiest way of seeing this is from the fact that if
is a
-Sylow subgroup, then:
or:
It is 1 modulo the prime
Further information: Congruence condition on Sylow numbers
This is the congruence condition on the Sylow number. It states that:
This follows from the fact that if we fix any one Sylow subgroup and look at the orbits on the set
of all Sylow subgroups under conjugation by elements of
, all the orbits except
itself have sizes as multiples of
.
We can in fact refine the congruence condition further, to obtain certain conditions where we can force to be 1 modulo higher powers of
. The idea in those is to argue that any intersection of Sylow subgroups must have large index in both.
Other facts
- Congruence condition on Sylow numbers in terms of maximal Sylow intersection
- Sylow subgroups are in correspondence with Sylow subgroups of quotient by central subgroup: In particular, this implies that the Sylow numbers of a group are the same as the Sylow numbers of the quotient by its center. Thus, for the study of Sylow numbers, it is sufficient to look at centerless groups.
Particular cases
Here, we list some finite non-nilpotent groups, along with their Sylow numbers. Note that for finite nilpotent groups (and in particular for finite abelian groups) all the Sylow numbers are equal to . In fact, we concentrate on centerless groups because the Sylow numbers of a group are the same as those of its quotient by its center.
Group | Order | ![]() |
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Other groups admitting it as quotient by center or hypercenter |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
symmetric group:S3 | 6 | 3 | 1 | direct product of S3 and Z2, dicyclic group:Dic12, direct product of S3 and Z3 | ||
dihedral group:D10 | 10 | 5 | 1 | |||
alternating group:A4 | 12 | 1 | 4 | special linear group:SL(2,3), direct product of A4 and Z2 | ||
wreath product of Z3 and Z2 | 18 | 1 | 3 | |||
generalized dihedral group for E9 | 18 | 1 | 9 | |||
symmetric group:S4 | 24 | 3 | 4 | general linear group:GL(2,3), binary octahedral group |
Using Sylow numbers
Note that the above constraints on Sylow numbers are all constraints that arise purely from the order of the group. Thus, given any positive integer , we define a set of Sylow numbers for this positive integer as a set (ordered) of associations of
to each prime
dividing
such that there exists a group
of order
whose Sylow numbers are precisely
.
Of course, given a positive integer, there may be many possibilities for the set of Sylow numbers for that positive integer. Imposing conditions on the kind of group we allow can put further constraints on the set of Sylow numbers. For instance:
- A set of simple Sylow numbers is a set of Sylow numbers that arises from a simple group.