On uniformly fully inert subgroups of abelian groups

Abstract If H is a subgroup of an abelian group G and φ ∈ End(G), H is called φ-inert (and φ is H-inertial) if φ(H) ∩ H has finite index in the image φ(H). The notion of φ-inert subgroup arose and was investigated in a relevant way in the study of the so called intrinsic entropy of an endomorphism φ, while inertial endo-morphisms (these are endomorphisms that are H-inertial for every subgroup H) were intensively studied by Rinauro and the first named author. A subgroup H of an abelian group G is said to be fully inert if it is φ-inert for every φ ∈ End(G). This property, inspired by the “dual” notion of inertial endomorphism, has been deeply investigated for many different types of groups G. It has been proved that in some cases all fully inert subgroups of an abelian group G are commensurable with a fully invariant subgroup of G (e.g., when G is free or a direct sum of cyclic p-groups). One can strengthen the notion of fully inert subgroup by defining H to be uniformly fully inert if there exists a positive integer n such that |(H + φH)/H| ≤ n for every φ ∈ End(G). The aim of this paper is to study the uniformly fully inert subgroups of abelian groups. A natural question arising in this investigation is whether such a subgroup is commensurable with a fully invariant subgroup. This paper provides a positive answer to this question for groups belonging to several classes of abelian groups.