Quotients of braid groups by their congruence subgroups

Abstract

The congruence subgroups of braid groups arise from a congruence condition on the integral Burau representation $B_n \to \operatorname{GL}_{n}(\mathbb Z)$. We find the image of such congruence subgroups in $\operatorname{GL}_{n}(\mathbb Z)$-an open problem posed by Dan Margalit. Additionally, we characterize the quotients of braid groups by their congruence subgroups in terms of symplectic congruence subgroups.