Soficity, Amenability, and LEF-ness for topological full groups

Abstract: In this paper, we study several finite approximation properties of topological full groups of group actions on the Cantor set such that free points are dense. Firstly, we establish that for such a distal action $\alpha$ of a countable discrete group $G$ on the Cantor set, the topological full group $[[\alpha]]$ is amenable if and only if $G$ is amenable. This result is obtained through a novel method that detects hyperfiniteness in certain sofic approximation graph sequences of finitely generated subgroups of $[[\alpha]]$. We also provide estimates for related F{\o}lner functions. Next, we obtain negative results on the amenability of topological full groups for actions with zero topological entropy by calculating the topological entropy of certain examples provided by Elek and Monod. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the topological full group $[[\alpha]]$ of a minimal topologically free residually finite action $\alpha$ on the Cantor set is locally embeddable in the class of finite groups (LEF). This generalizes a result previously obtained by Grigorchuk and Medynets in the case of minimal $\mathbb{Z}$-actions. As an application, we show that topological full groups of certain Toeplitz subshifts on free groups are LEF and therefore sofic.