In this work the authors develop a decomposition theory for subgroups of Out(Fn) which generalizes the decomposition theory for individual elements of Out(Fn) found in the work of Bestvina, Feighn, and Handel, and which is analogous to the decomposition theory for subgroups of mapping class groups found in the work of Ivanov.

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This volume is an outgrowth of the Sixth Workshop on Lie Theory and Geometry, held in the province of Cordoba, Argentina in November 2007. The representation theory and structure theory of Lie groups play a pervasive role throughout mathematics and physics. Lie groups are tightly intertwined with geometry and each stimulates developments in the other. The aim of this volume is to bring to a larger audience the mutually beneficial interaction between Lie theorists and geometers that animated the workshop. Two prominent themes of the representation theoretic articles are Gelfand pairs and the representation theory of real reductive Lie groups. Among the more geometric articles are an exposition of major recent developments on noncompact homogeneous Einstein manifolds and aspects of inverse spectral geometry presented in settings accessible to readers new to the area.

The appearance of mapping class groups in mathematics is ubiquitous. The book presents 23 papers containing problems about mapping class groups, the moduli space of Riemann surfaces, Teichmuller geometry, and related areas. Each paper focusses completely on open problems and directions. The problems range in scope from specific computations, to broad programs. The goal is to have a rich source of problems which have been formulated explicitly and accessibly. The book is divided into four parts. Part I contains problems on the combinatorial and (co)homological group-theoretic aspects of mapping class groups, and the way in which these relate to problems in geometry and topology. Part II concentrates on connections with classification problems in 3-manifold theory, the theory of symplectic 4-manifolds, and algebraic geometry. A wide variety of problems, from understanding billiard trajectories to the classification of Kleinian groups, can be reduced to differential and synthetic geometry problems about moduli space. Such problems and connections are discussed in Part III. Mapping class groups are related, both concretely and philosophically, to a number of other groups, such as braid groups, lattices in semisimple Lie groups, and automorphism groups of free groups. Part IV concentrates on problems surrounding these relationships. This book should be of interest to anyone studying geometry, topology, algebraic geometry or infinite groups. It is meant to provide inspiration for everyone from graduate students to senior researchers.

This volume features seventeen extended conference abstracts corresponding to selected talks given by participants at the CRM research program “Automorphisms of Free Groups: Algorithms, Geometry and Dynamics”, which took place at the Centre de Recerca Matemàtica in Barcelona in fall 2012. Most of them are short articles giving preliminary presentations of new results not yet published in regular research journals. The articles are the result from a direct collaboration among active researchers in the area after working in a dynamic and productive atmosphere. The book is intended for established researchers in the area of Group Theory, as well as for PhD and postdoc students who wish to learn more about the latest advances in this active area of research.