Group extension

Let $F$ and $G$ be groups. An extension of $G$ by $F$ is a solution to the problem of finding a group $E$ that contains a normal subgroup $F'$ isomorphic to $F$ such that the quotient group $E/F'$ is isomorphic to $G$ .

More specifically, an extension $\mathcal{E}$ of $G$ by $F$ is a triple $(E,i,p)$ where $E$ is a group, $i$ is an injective group homomorphism of $F$ into $E$ , and $p$ is a surjective homomorphism of $E$ onto $G$ such that the kernel of $p$ is the image of $i$ . Often, the extension $\mathcal{E}$ is written as the diagram $\mathcal{E} : F \stackrel{i}{\to} E \stackrel{p}{\to} G$ .

An extension is central if $i(F)$ lies in the center of $E$ ; this is only possible if $F$ is commutative. It is called trivial if $E = F \times G$ (the direct product of $F$ and $G$ ), $i$ is the canonical mapping of $F$ into $F\times G$ , and $p$ is the projection homomorphism onto $G$ .

A retraction of an extension is a homomorphism $r: E\to F$ such that $r\circ i$ is the identity function on $F$ . Similarly, a section of an extension is a homomorphism $s : G \to E$ such that $p \circ s = \text{Id}_G$ .

Equivalence of Extensions

Theorem 1. Let $\mathcal{E} : F \stackrel{i}{\to} E \stackrel{p}{\to} G$ and $\mathcal{E}' : F \stackrel{i'}{\to} E' \stackrel{p'}{\to} G$ be extensions of $G$ by $F$ . Let $u : E \to E'$ be a morphism of extensions. Then $u$ is an isomorphism of $E$ onto $E'$ . In other words, every extension morphism is an extension isomorphism.

Theorem 2. Let $\mathcal{E} : F \stackrel{i}{\to} E \stackrel{p}{\to} G$ be an extension of $G$ by $F$ . Then the following are equivalent:

$\mathcal{E}$ is the trivial extension;
$\mathcal{E}$ admits a retraction;
$\mathcal{E}$ admits a section $s$ such that $s(G)$ lies in the centralizer of $i(F)$ .

Proof. If $\mathcal{E}$ is the trivial extension, then the projection onto $F$ and the canonical injection of $G$ into $E$ show that conditions 2 and 3 are satisfied. If $\mathcal{E}$ has a retraction $r$ , then the mapping $(r,p): E \to F \times G$ is an extension morphism, so $\mathcal{E}$ is isomorphic to the trivial extension. If (3) holds, then the mapping $(f,g) \mapsto i(f)s(g)$ is an extension morphism $F\times G \to \mathcal{E}$ , so again $\mathcal{E}$ is isomorphic to the trivial extension of $G$ by $F$ . $\blacksquare$

Note that an extension $F \stackrel{i}{\to} E \stackrel{p}{\to} G$ may be nontrivial, but $E$ may still be isomorphic to $F \times G$ .