The Structure of Critical Product Sets

Abstract: Let $G$ be a multiplicative group, let $A,B \subseteq G$ be finite and nonempty, and define the product set $AB = {ab \mid $a \in A$ and $b \in B$}$. Two fundamental problems in combinatorial number theory are to find lower bounds on $|AB|$, and then to determine structural properties of $A$ and $B$ under the assumption that $|AB|$ is small. We focus on the extreme case when $|AB| < |A| + |B|$, and call any such pair $(A,B)$ \emph{critical}. In the case when $|G|$ is prime, the Cauchy-Davenport Theorem asserts that $|AB| \ge \min {|G|, |A| + |B| - 1}$, and Vosper refined this result by classifying all critical pairs in these groups. For abelian groups, Kneser proved a natural generalization of Cauchy-Davenport by showing that there exists $H \le G$ so that $|AB| \ge |A| + |B| - |H|$ and $ABH = AB$. Kemperman then proved a result which characterizes the structure of all critical pairs in abelian groups. Our main result gives a classification of all critical pairs in an arbitrary group $G$. As a consequence of this we derive the following generalization of Kneser's Theorem to arbitrary groups: There exists $H \le G$ so that $|AB| \ge |A| + |B| - |H|$ and so that for every $y \in AB$ there exists $x \in G$ so that $y(x^{-1} H x) \subseteq AB$.