Table of Contents

Subgroup

Definition

Let be a group, and let be a nonempty subset of . Then is called a of if the following hold:

  1. for all one has , and
  2. is a group.

When is a subgroup of , we write . Any subgroup of that is not equal to itself is called a . The subset of consisting of just the identity is called the .

Definition 2

Let be a subset of a group . We say is a subgroup of if is a group itself when using the multiplication structure of restricted to . We'll write to mean is a subgroup of .


Remarks

Is this generic enough to work with both definitions of group that we know we'll be using? Do the words “restricted to” require a definition as well.

I think the definition I gave above could be improved. I tried to avoid talking about binary operations so we can use this for both the and definitions.


$\LaTeX$ version

definition.subgroup.tex
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% DEPENDENCIES 
% RequiredMacros: \newcommand{\textdef}[1]{\textit{#1}} 
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\begin{definition}
Let $(G,\cdot)$ be a group, and let $H$ be a nonempty subset of $G$. Then $H$ is called a \textdef{subgroup} of $G$ if the following hold:
\begin{enumerate}
\item \textbf{[Closure]} for all $h,k\in H$ one has $h\cdot k\in H$, and
\item  $(H,\cdot)$ is a group.
\end{enumerate}
When $H$ is a subgroup of $G$, we write $H\le G$.  Any subgroup of $G$ that is not equal to $G$ itself is called a \textdef{proper subgroup}. The subset of $G$ consisting of just the identity is called the \textdef{trivial subgroup}.
\end{definition}