Constructions of almost difference families

Almost difference families (ADFs) are a useful generalization of almost difference sets (ADSs). In this paper, we present some constructive techniques to obtain ADFs and establish a number of infinite classes of ADFs. Our results can be regarded as a generalization of the known difference families. It is clear that ADFs give partially balance incomplete block designs which arise in a natural way in many combinatorial and statistical problems.     

Generic constructions for partitioned difference families with applications: a unified combinatorial approach

Partitioned difference families are an interesting class of discrete structures which can be used to derive optimal constant composition codes. There have been intensive researches on the construction of partitioned difference families. In this paper, we consider the combinatorial approach. We introduce a new combinatorial configuration named partitioned relative difference family, which proves to be very powerful in the construction of partitioned difference families. In particular, we present two general recursive constructions, which not only include some existing constructions as special cases, but also generate many new series of partitioned difference families. As an application, we use these partitioned difference families to construct several new classes of optimal constant composition codes.     

Cyclotomic constructions of external difference families and disjoint difference families

External difference families (EDFs) are a type of new combinatorial designs originated from cryptography. Some results had been obtained by Chang and Ding, the connection between EDFs and disjoint difference families (DDFs) was also established. In this paper, further cyclotomic constructions of EDFs and DDFs are presented, and several classes of EDFs and DDFs are obtained. Answers to problems 1 and 4 by Chang and Ding are also given. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Combin Designs 17: 333–341, 2009     

Constructions of optimal difference systems of sets

Difference systems of sets (DSSs) are combinatorial configurations which were introduced in 1971 by Levenstein for the construction of codes for synchronization. In this paper, we present two kinds of constructions of difference systems of sets by using disjoint difference families and a special type of difference sets, respectively. As a consequence, new infinite classes of optimal DSSs are obtained.     

Strong difference families,difference covers,and their applications for relative difference families

In (M. Buratti, J Combin Des 7:406–425, 1999), Buratti pointed out the lack of systematic treatments of constructions for relative difference families. The concept of strong difference families was introduced to cover such a problem. However, unfortunately, only a few papers consciously using the useful concept have appeared in the literature in the past 10 years. In this paper, strong difference families, difference covers and their connections with relative difference families and optical orthogonal codes are discussed.      

Constructions and bounds for separating hash families

In this paper, we present a new construction for strong separating hash families by using hypergraphs and obtain some optimal separating hash families. We also improve some previously known bounds of separating hash families.     

Constructions of categories of setoids from proof-irrelevant families

When formalizing mathematics in constructive type theories, or more practically in proof assistants such as Coq or Agda, one is often using setoids (types with explicit equivalence relations). In this note we consider two categories of setoids with equality on objects and show, within intensional Martin-Löf type theory, that they are isomorphic. Both categories are constructed from a fixed proof-irrelevant family F of setoids. The objects of the categories form the index setoid I of the family, whereas the definition of arrows differs. The first category has for arrows triples \((a,b,f:F(a)\,\rightarrow \,F(b))\) where f is an extensional function. Two such arrows are identified if appropriate composition with transportation maps (given by F) makes them equal. In the second category the arrows are triples \((a,b,R \hookrightarrow \Sigma (I,F)^2)\) where R is a total functional relation between the subobjects \(F(a), F(b) \hookrightarrow \Sigma (I,F)\) of the setoid sum of the family. This category is simpler to use as the transportation maps disappear. Moreover we also show that the full image of a category along an E-functor into an E-category is a category.     

Constructions of new families of nonbinary CSS codes

New families of good q-ary (q is an odd prime power) Calderbank-Shor-Steane (CSS) quantum codes derived from two distinct classical Bose-Chaudhuri-Hocquenghem (BCH) codes, not necessarily self-orthogonal, are constructed. These new families consist of CSS codes whose parameters are better than the ones available in the literature and comparable to the parameters of quantum BCH codes generated by applying the q-ary Steane’s enlargement of CSS codes.     

Constructions of non-principal families in extremal hypergraph theory

A family F of k-graphs is called non-principal if its Turán density is strictly smaller than that of each individual member. For each k?3 we find two (explicit) k-graphs F and G such that {F,G} is non-principal. Our proofs use stability results for hypergraphs. This completely settles the question posed by Mubayi and Rödl [On the Turán number of triple systems, J. Combin. Theory A, 100 (2002) 135-152].Also, we observe that the demonstrated non-principality phenomenon holds also with respect to the Ramsey-Turán density as well.     

Near-complete external difference families

We introduce and explore near-complete external difference families, a partitioning of the nonidentity elements of a group so that each nonidentity element is expressible as a difference of elements from distinct subsets a fixed number of times. We show that the existence of such an object implies the existence of a near-resolvable design. We provide examples and general constructions of these objects, some of which lead to new parameter families of near-resolvable designs on a non-prime-power number of points. Our constructions employ cyclotomy, partial difference sets, and Galois rings.     

Constructions of almost difference sets from finite fields

Almost difference sets are an interesting subject of combinatorics, and have applications in many areas of engineering such as CDMA communications, error correcting codes and cryptography. The objective of this paper is to present some new constructions of almost difference sets, together with several results on the equivalence relation.     

Hadamard matrices and difference families

Translated from Matematicheskie Zametki, Vol. 47, No. 3, pp. 11–16, March, 1990.     

On simple radical difference families

For q a prime power and k odd (even), we define a (q,k,1) difference family to be radical if each base block is a coset of the kth roots of unity in the multiplicative group of GF(q) (the union of a coset of the (k ? 1)th roots of unity in the multiplicative group of GF(q) with zero). Such a family will be denoted by RDF. The main result on this subject is a theorem dated 1972 by R.M. Wilson; it is a sufficient condition for the existence of a (q,k, 1)-RDF for any k. We improve this result by replacing Wilson's condition with another sufficient but weaker condition, which is proved to be necessary at least for k ? 7. As a consequence, we get new difference families and hence new Steiner 2-designs. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Partial geometric difference sets and partial geometric difference families

The concept of a partial geometric difference set (or $1\frac{1}{2}$-difference set) was introduced by Olmez in 2014. Recently, Nowak, Olmez and Song introduced the notion of a partial geometric difference family, which generalizes both the classical difference family and the partial geometric difference set. It was shown that partial geometric difference sets and partial difference families give rise to partial geometric designs. In this paper, a number of new infinite families of partial geometric difference sets and partial geometric difference families are constructed. From these partial geometric difference sets and difference families, we generate a list of infinite families of partial geometric designs.     

Recursive constructions for difference matrices and relative difference families

We present a new recursive construction for difference matrices whose application allows us to improve some results by D. Jungnickel. For instance, we prove that for any Abelian p-group G of type (n₁, n₂, …, n_t) there exists a (G, p^e, 1) difference matrix with e = Also, we prove that for any group G there exists a (G, p, 1) difference matrix where p is the smallest prime dividing |G|. Difference matrices are then used for constructing, recursively, relative difference families. We revisit some constructions by M. J. Colbourn, C. J. Colbourn, D. Jungnickel, K. T. Phelps, and R. M. Wilson. Combining them we get, in particular, the existence of a multiplier (G, k, λ)-DF for any Abelian group G of nonsquare-free order, whenever there exists a (p, k, λ)-DF for each prime p dividing |G|. Then we focus our attention on a recent construction by M. Jimbo. We improve this construction and prove, as a corollary, the existence of a (G, k, λ)-DF for any group G under the same conditions as above. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Combin Designs 6: 165–182, 1998     

Existence question for difference families and construction of some new families

We establish some properties of mixed difference families. We obtain some criteria for the existence of such families and a special kind of multipliers. Several methods are presented for the construction of difference families by using cyclotomy and genetic algorithms. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Combin Designs 12: 256–270, 2004.     

New partial geometric difference sets and partial geometric difference families

Using Galois rings and Galois fields, we construct several infinite classes of partial geometric difference sets, and partial geometric difference families, with new parameters. Furthermore, these partial geometric difference sets (and partial geometric difference families) correspond to new infinite families of directed strongly regular graphs. We also discuss some of the links between partially balanced designs, 2-adesigns (which were recently coined by Cunsheng Ding in “Codes from Difference Sets” (2015)), and partial geometric designs, and make an investigation into when a 2-adesign is a partial geometric design.