The genera, reflexibility and simplicity of regular maps

  • Marston D. E. Conder

    University of Auckland, New Zealand
  • Jozef Širáň

    Slovak University of Technology, Bratislava, Slovak Republic
  • Thomas W. Tucker

    Colgate University, Hamilton, United States

Abstract

This paper uses combinatorial group theory to help answer some long-standing questions about the genera of orientable surfaces that carry particular kinds of regular maps. By classifying all orientably-regular maps whose automorphism group has order coprime to g −1, where g is the genus, all orientably-regular maps of genus p+1 for p prime are determined. As a consequence, it is shown that orientable surfaces of infinitely many genera carry no regular map that is chiral (irreflexible), and that orientable surfaces of infinitely many genera carry no reflexible regular map with simple underlying graph. Another consequence is a simpler proof of the Breda–Nedela–Širáň classification of non-orientable regular maps of Euler characteristic −_p_ where p is prime.

Cite this article

Marston D. E. Conder, Jozef Širáň, Thomas W. Tucker, The genera, reflexibility and simplicity of regular maps. J. Eur. Math. Soc. 12 (2010), no. 2, pp. 343–364

DOI 10.4171/JEMS/200