The Dehn function of SL(n;Z)

Abstract

We prove that when n >= 5, the Dehn function of SL(n;Z) is quadratic. The proof involves decomposing a disc in SL(n;R)/SO(n) into triangles of varying sizes. By mapping these triangles into SL(n;Z) and replacing large elementary matrices by "shortcuts," we obtain words of a particular form, and we use combinatorial techniques to fill these loops.