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MAT 444

Intro to Abstract Algebra April 2005 Class equation, example: symmetric group S6

Denition: Two permutations , Sn are said to be of the same cycle type if there exist pairwise disjoint cycles i and pairwise disjoint cycles i such that = 1 2 . . . r and = 1 2 . . . r and such that for each 1 i r the lengths of the cycles i and i are equal. Proposition: Two permutations , Sn are of the same cycle type if and only if they are conjugate in Sn , i.e. if there exists a permutation Sn such that = 1 . [[The proof is elementary and straightforward.]] Consider Sn acting on itself by conjugation: : Sn Sn Sn , : (, ) 1 . For any in the conjugacy class (orbit, cycle-type) under consideration, let CS6 ( ) = { S6 : 1 = } denote its centralizer, i.e. the set of permutations that permute with . To obtain the class equation for S6 compute the size of each orbit: Partition 6=6 6=5+1 6=4+2 6=4+1+1 6=3+3 6=3+2+1 6=3+1+1+1 6=2+2+2 6=2+2+1+1 6=2+1+1+1+1 6=1+1+1+1+1+1 Class equation for S6 : |CS6 (i )| 6 51=5 42=8 4 2! = 8 3 3 2! = 18 32=6 3 3! = 18 2 2 2 3! = 48 2 2 2! 2! = 16 2 4! = 48 6! = 720
1 3! 1 2!2! 1 4! 1 3! 1 2! 1 2!

Size of orbit = |G: CG (i )|


6 6 6 5 6 4 6 4 3 3 3 2 6 3 4 2 4 2 6 2
1 6!

cum sum 120 264 354 444 484 604 644 659 704 719 720

1 1 2 2 2 1

6! 6

=
5! 5

6 5 4 3 2 1 6

= 120 = 144
2 1 2

= = =

6 5 4 3 2 5 6 5 4 3 4 4! 4 1 2!

4!2! 4 2

= 90 = 90 = 40

1 1

6 5 4 3 4

6 3 6 3

1 1

3!3! 3 3

6 5 4 3 6 5 4 3 3! 3

3 2 1 3 3 2 2

2 1

3!2! 3 2

=
1 3!

= 120 = 40
2 1 2

3 1 2 2 2 1 4 1 3 1 5 1

1 1

=
6 5 2

6 5 4 3

6 2 6 2

2!2!2! 2 2 2

4 3 2

= 15 = 45

1 1 2 1 4 1

2! 2! 2 2

=
2 1

1 2! 2! 2

6 5 2

4 3 2

1 1 3 1

=
1 1

6 5 2

= 15

6 1

=1

720 = 1 + (120 + 144 + 90 + 90 + 40 + 120 + 40 + 15 + 45 + 15 + 1)

Comments: If a permutation = 1 2 . . . r is the product of pairwise disjoint cycles of pairwise dierent lengths ni = |i |, then its centralizer consists of the n1 n2 . . . nr distinct elements of the direct product of the cyclic groups generated by these cycles: CG ( ) =< 1 >< 2 > . . . < r >. If some of the disjoint cycles have equal lengths, then the stabilizer may be considerably larger. For example, the stabilizer of the product (1 2)(3 4)(5)(6) not only contains the orbits < (1 2) > and < (3 4) >, but also the permutation (1 3)(2 4) which permutes the elements of the set { {1, 2}, {3, 4} }. In more generality, if the product contains k cycles of the same length, then the centralizer contains a copy of Sk that permutes the sets of generators of the orbits. Knowing the size of the centralizer of an (and thus of any) element of an orbit, the size of the orbits is immediately calculated as the index of the centralizer in Sn . This is the way we want to practice counting in our algebra class. For comparison, more naively, one may simply count the elements of each orbit directly. The table above suggests two dierent view points. One way inductively counts the number of ways to select ni elements from the remaining n (n1 + . . . ni1 ) elements (simple binomial coecients), and multiplies by the number of ways to put them in order in the respective cycles accounting for ni dierent ways to list the rst element of the same ni -cycle, and for the number of permutations of cycles of the same size. Or more directly, one immediately counts the number of ways to choose the j -th element of each ni cycle from the remaining n (n1 + . . . ni1 ) (j 1) elements, again accounting for ni dierent ways to list the rst element of the same ni -cycle, and for the number of permutations of cycles of the same size.

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