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Will Chen
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what is the intersection of all congruence subgroups of the profinite completion of SL(2,Z)?

Let $\widehat{SL(2,\mathbb{Z})}$ be the profinite completion of $SL(2,\mathbb{Z})$. Let $\Gamma(N)$ denote the typical principal congruence subgroup of $SL(2,\mathbb{Z})$ (ie, all matrices congruent to the identity mod $N$). Let $\overline{\Gamma(N)}$ denote its closure in $\widehat{SL(2,\mathbb{Z})}$.

Can we describe generators for $\bigcap_{N\ge 1}\overline{\Gamma(N)}$? (At first I thought this would be trivial, but since $SL(2,\mathbb{Z})$ has noncongruence subgroups, the congruence subgroups do not form a fundamental system of neighborhoods of the identity in $\widehat{SL(2,\mathbb{Z})}$, so now I'm rather uncertain...)

What about $\bigcap_{N\ge 1}\overline{\Gamma_1(N)}$?

($\Gamma_1(N)$ is the subgroup consisting of matrices which mod $N$ are upper triangular unipotent).

Will Chen
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  • 74