Georgia Institute of Technology College of Sciences

A conjecture of Ivanov asserts that finite index subgroups of the mapping class group of higher genus surfaces have trivial rational homology. Putman and Wieland use what they call higher Prym representations, which are extensions of the representation induced by the action of the mapping class group on homology, to better understand the conjecture. In particular, they prove that if Ivanov's conjecture is true for some genus g surface, it is true for all higher genus surfaces. On the other hand, they also prove that if there is a counterexample to Ivanov's conjecture, it is of a specific form.