On groups with a class-preserving outer automorphism

Abstract

Four infinite families of 2-groups are presented, all of whose members possess an outer automorphism that preserves conjugacy classes. The groups in these families are central extensions of their predecessors by a cyclic group of order 2. For each integer $r>1$, there is precisely one 2-group of nilpotency class $r$ in each of the four families. All other known families of 2-groups possessing a class-preserving outer automorphism consist entirely of groups of nilpotency class 2.