Universal theories for rigid soluble groups

A group is said to be p-rigid, where p is a natural number, if it has a normal series of the form G = G ₁ > G ₂ > … > G _p  > G _p+1 = 1, whose quotients G _i /G _i+1 are Abelian and are torsion free when treated as $\mathbb{Z}$[G/G _i ]-modules. Examples of rigid groups are free soluble groups. We point out a recursive system of universal axioms distinguishing p-rigid groups in the class of p-soluble groups. It is proved that if F is a free p-soluble group, G is an arbitrary p-rigid group, and W is an iterated wreath product of p infinite cyclic groups, then ∀-theories for these groups satisfy the inclusions $\mathcal{A}(F) \supseteq \mathcal{A}(G) \supseteq \mathcal{A}(W)$. We construct an ∃-axiom distinguishing among p-rigid groups those that are universally equivalent to W. An arbitrary p-rigid group embeds in a divisible decomposed p-rigid group M = M(α₁,…, α _p ). The latter group factors into a semidirect product of Abelian groups A ₁ A ₂…A _p , in which case every quotient M _i /M _i+1 of its rigid series is isomorphic to A _i and is a divisible module of rank α_i over a ring $\mathbb{Z}$[M/M _i ]. We specify a recursive system of axioms distinguishing among M-groups those that are Muniversally equivalent to M. As a consequence, it is stated that the universal theory of M with constants in M is decidable. By contrast, the universal theory of W with constants is undecidable.