Representation stability in the level 4 braid group

Abstract: We investigate the cohomology of the level 4 subgroup of the braid group, namely, the kernel of the mod 4 reduction of the Burau representation at $t=-1$. This group is also equal to the kernel of the mod 2 abelianization of the pure braid group. We give an exact formula for the first Betti number; it is a quartic polynomial in the number of strands. We also show that, like the pure braid group, the first homology satisfies uniform representation stability in the sense of Church and Farb. Unlike the pure braid group, the group of symmetries - the quotient of the braid group by the level 4 subgroup - is one for which the representation theory has not been well studied; we develop its representation theory. This group is a non-split extension of the symmetric group. As applications of our main results, we show that the rational cohomology ring of the level 4 braid group is not generated in degree 1 when the number of strands is at least 15, and we compute all Betti numbers of the level 4 braid group when the number of strands is at most 4. We also derive a new lower bound on the first rational Betti number of the hyperelliptic Torelli group and on the top rational Betti number of the level 4 mapping class group in genus 2. Finally, we apply our results to locate all of the 2-torsion points on the characteristic varieties of the pure braid group.