Jennifer Taback

Contact Information

Department of Mathematics
8600 College Station
Brunswick, ME 04011
jtaback@bowdoin.edu
(207) 725-3951

Education

1998	Ph.D. in Mathematics, The University of Chicago. Advisor: Benson Farb. Thesis: Quasi-isometric rigidity for PSL₂(ℤ[1/p]).
1994	M.A. in Mathematics, The University of Chicago
1993	B.A. in Mathematics, Yale University

Employment

2004–present	Bowdoin College. Chair, Department of Mathematics, 2020–2024.
1999–2004	Assistant Professor of Mathematics, University at Albany.
1998–1999	Charles B. Morrey Assistant Professor, University of California, Berkeley.

Service to the American Mathematical Society

Member of the Board of Trustees, February 2022--January 2027.
Chair of the Board of Trustees, August 2024--January 2026.
Co-chair of the Campaign for the Next Generation Capital Campaign, with Ken Ribet and Robert Lazarsfeld, September 2017--2019.
Member of the Executive Committee, February 2016--January 2018.
Member of the Council, February 2014--January 2018.
Member of the Rebranding Committee, with Ken Ribet and Robert Lazarsfeld, 2016-2017.
Chair of the Eastern Sectional Program Committee of the American Mathematical Society, 2012-2014.

Research Interests

My research is in geometric group theory: I study metric and combinatorial properties of infinite finitely generated groups. Current projects include understanding properties of medium-scale discrete Ricci curvature for Cayley graphs, a notion introduced by Bar-Natan, Duchin and Kropholler; conditions that guarantee a finitely generated group is systolic; the conjugacy problem for Diestel-Leader groups; and various projects on biautomatic groups.

Research Papers

Link to papers on the ArXiV
Link to papers on MathSciNet, available with a Mathscinet subsription
Link to papers on ResearchGate

Quasi-isometric rigidity

Quasi-isometric rigidity of PSL(2,Z[1/p]), Duke Math. Journal, Vol. 101, No. 2 (2000), 335-357.
The large scale geometry of some metabelian groups (joint with Kevin Whyte), Michigan Math. Journal, Vol. 52 No. 1 (2004), 205-218.
A quasi-isometry classification of iterated Baumslag-Solitar groups (joint with Tullia Dymarz and Kevin Whyte), in preparation.

Medium-scale discrete Ricci curvature

Medium-scale Ricci curvature for Thompson's group F (joint with Sean Cleary), in preparation.
Conjugation curvature in solvable Baumslag-Solitar groups (joint with Alden Walker), Journal of Topology and Analysis, Vol. 15 (2023), no. 2, 299--360.

Twisted Conjugacy Classes

Twisted conjugacy and quasi-isomety invariance for generalized solvable Baumslag-Solitar groups (joint with Peter Wong), J. Lond. Math. Soc. (2) 75 (2007), no. 3, 705--717.
A note on twisted conjugacy and generalized Baumslag-Solitar groups (joint with Peter Wong), 2006.
The geometry of twisted conjugacy classes in wreath products (joint with Peter Wong), Geometry, Rigidity and Group Actions, Chicago Lectures in Math., Univ. Chicago Press, Chicago, IL, 2011, 561-587.

Dehn Functions of groups

Equivalence of geometric and combinatorial Dehn functions (joint with Jose Burillo), New York Journal of Mathematics, Vol. 8 (2002), 169-179.
The Dehn function of PSL(2,Z[1/p]), Geom. Dedicata, Vol. 102 No. 1 (2003), 179-195.

Thompson's group F and generalizations

Bounding restricted rotation distance (joint with Sean Cleary), Information Proc. Letters, Vol. 88 No. 5 (2003), 251-256.
Geometric quasi-isometric embeddings into Thompson's group F (joint with Sean Cleary), New York Journal of Mathematics, Vol. 9 (2003), 141-148.
Thompson's group F is not almost convex (joint with Sean Cleary), J. Algebra, Vol. 270 No. 1 (2004), 133-149.
Combinatorial properties of Thompson's group F (joint with Sean Cleary), Trans. AMS., Vol. 356 No. 7 (2004), 2825--2849.
Seesaw words in Thompson's group F, (joint with Sean Cleary), in Jose Burillo, Sean Cleary, Murray Elder, Jennifer Taback and Enric Ventura, editors, Geometric Methods in Group Theory, Contemp. Math., Vol. 372, American Mathematical Society (2005), 147-160.
Bounding right-arm rotation distances (joint with Sean Cleary), Internat. J. Algebra Comput.17 (2007), no. 2, 369--399.
Combinatorial and metric properties of Thompson's group T (joint with Jose Burillo, Sean Cleary and Melanie Stein, Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. 361 (2009), no. 2, 631--652.
Computing word length in alternate presentations of Thompson's group F (joint with Melanie Stein and Matthew Horak), Internat. J. Algebra Comput.19 (2009), no. 8, 963-997.
Random subgroups of Thompson's group F (joint with Sean Cleary, Murray Elder and Andrew Reichnitzer), Groups Geom. Dyn. 4 (2010), no. 1, 91-126.
A note on convexity properties of Thompson's group F (joint with Melanie Stein and Matthew Horak), Journal of Group Theory Vol. 15 No. 1 (2012), 37--46, electronic.
Free Limits of Thompson's group F (joint with Azer Akhmedov and Melanie Stein) Geometriae Dedicata Vol. 155 No. 1 (2012), 163--176.

Lamplighter and Diestel-Leader groups

Dead end words in lamplighter groups and wreath products, (joint with Sean Cleary), The Quarterly Journal of Mathematics, Vol. 56 No. 2 (2005), 165-178.
Metric properties of the lamplighter group as an automata group, (joint with Sean Cleary), in Jose Burillo, Sean Cleary, Murray Elder, Jennifer Taback and Enric Ventura, editors, Geometric Methods in Group Theory, Contemp. Math., Vol. 372, American Mathematical Society (2005), 207-218.
Cone types and geodesic languages for lamplighter groups and Thompson's group F (joint with Sean Cleary and Murray Elder), J. Algebra, Vol. 303 No. 2 (2006), 476-500.
Metric properties of Diestel-Leader groups (joint with Melanie Stein), Michigan Math. J. Vol. 62 No. 2 (2013), 365--386.
Automorphisms of Diestel-Leader groups (joint with Melanie Stein and Peter Wong), Internat. J. Algebra Comput. Vol. 25, no. 8, (2015), 1275-1299.
Bilipschitz versus quasi-isometric equivalence for higher rank lamplighter groups (joint with Tullia Dymarz and Irine Peng), New York Journal of Mathematics Vol. 21 (2015), 129--150.
Higher rank lamplighter groups are graph automatic (joint with Sophie Berube and Tara Palnitkar), J. Algebra Vol. 496, (2018), 315-343.

Automatic groups and generalizations

Being Cayley automatic is closed under taking wreath produce with virtually cyclic groups (joint with Murray Elder and Dmitry Berkinsky), Bulletin of the Australian Math. Soc, Volume 104 , Issue 3 (2021), 464 -- 474.
On the geometry of Cayley automatic groups (joint with Murray Elder and Dmitry Berkinsky), to appear in the International Journal of Algebra and Computation.
C-graph automatic groups (joint with Murray Elder), J. Algebra 413 (2014), 289-319.
Tree based language complexity of Thompson's group F (joint with Sharif Younes), Groups, Complexity, Cryptology, Vol. 7, no. 2, (2015), 135-152.
Thompson's group F is 1-counter graph automatic (joint with Murray Elder), Groups, Complexity, Cryptology, Vol. 8, no. 1, (2016), 21-33.

Other papers

Surface Symmetries and PSL_2(p), (joint with Murad Ozaydin and Charlotte Simmons), Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. Vol. 359 (2007), 2243--2268.
A new proof of the growth rate of the solvable Baumslag-Solitar groups (joint with Alden Walker), Geometriae Dedicata, Vol. 216, issue 2 (2022).
Generalized small cancellation presentations for systolic groups (joint with Robert Gilman and Alden Walker), in preparation.

Books/Chapters

Geometric Methods in Group Theory, Jose Burillo, Sean Cleary, Murray Elder, Jennifer Taback and Enric Ventura, editors, Contemp. Math., Vol. 371, Amer. Math. Soc., Providence, RI, 2005.
An Introduction to Lamplighter Groups, in M. Clay and D. Margalit, Editors, Office Hours with a Geometric Group Theorist, Princeton University Press (2017).

Conferences and Sessions Organized

Communicating Mathematics, Joint Mathematics Meetings, January 2026. Co-organizers: Kathryn Mann, Emily Riehl, et al.
Communicating Mathematics, Cornell University, August 2022. Co-organizers: Kathryn Mann and Emily Riehl.
No Boundaries: groups in algebra, geometry and topology, The University of Chicago, October 2017. Co-organizers: Tara Brendle, Daniel Margalit and Kevin Wortman.
American Mathematical Society Eastern Sectional Meeting, Bowdoin College, September 2016. Campus organizer.
American Mathematical Society Sectional Meetings, Special Sessions: Bowdoin College (2016); Wesleyan University (2008); University of New Hampshire (2006); Seville, Spain (2003); Northeastern University (2002).
Collaboration conference (Mellon Foundation grant), Bowdoin College, March 2011. Co-organizers: Thomas Pietraho, Scott Taylor and Peter Wong.
Fixed point theory and related topics, Bates College, April 2006. Co-organizer: Peter Wong.
AIM Workshop: Thompson's group at 40 years, American Institute of Mathematics, January 2004. Co-organizers: Sean Cleary, Steve Gersten and John Stallings.