A New Topological Helly Theorem and Some Transversal Results

We prove that for a topological space \(X\) with the property that \( H_{*}(U)=0\) for \(*\ge d\) and every open subset \(U\) of \(X\) , a finite family of open sets in \(X\) has nonempty intersection if for any subfamily of size \(j,\,1\le j\le d+1,\) the \((d-j)\) -dimensional homology group of its intersection is zero. We use this theorem to prove new results concerning transversal affine planes to families of convex sets.     

The Ubiquity of the Orders of Fractional Semifields of Even Characteristic

To each non-square integer \(2^{2N+1}\ge 2^5\) there correspond semifields \(D\) of order of \(2^{2N+1}\) that contain \(\text{ GF}(4)\) . Hence there exist affine planes for each non-square order \(2^{2N+1}\ge 2^{5}\) that contain subaffine planes of order \(2^2\) . Moreover, there also exists semifields \(D_1\) and \(D_2\) , with \(|D_1|= |D_2| =|D|\) such that \(D_1\) is commutative and \(D_2\) is non-commutative but neither \(D_1\) nor \(D_2\) contains \(\text{ GF}(4)\) .     

Two-dimensional slices of nonpseudoconvex domains with rough boundary

For a domain \(D\subset {\mathbb C}^n,\; n\ge 3\) , the set \(E\) is defined as the set of all points \(z\in {\mathbb C}^n\) for which the intersection of \(D\) with every complex \(2\) -plane through \(z\) is pseudoconvex. For \(D\) nonpseudoconvex, it is shown that \(E\) is contained in an affine subspace of codimension \(2\) . This results solves a problem raised by Nikolov and Pflug.     

Construction of relative difference sets and Hadamard groups

‘There exist normal \((2m,2,2m,m)\) relative difference sets and thus Hadamard groups of order \(4m\) for all \(m\) of the form $$\begin{aligned} m= x2^{a+t+u+w+\delta -\epsilon +1}6^b 9^c 10^d 22^e 26^f \prod _{i=1}^s p_i^{4a_i} \prod _{i=1}^t q_i^2 \prod _{i=1}^u \left( (r_i+1)/2)r_i^{v_i}\right) \prod _{i=1}^w s_i \end{aligned}$$ under the following conditions: \(a,b,c,d,e,f,s,t,u,w\) are nonnegative integers, \(a_1,\ldots ,a_r\) and \(v_1,\ldots ,v_u\) are positive integers, \(p_1,\ldots ,p_s\) are odd primes, \(q_1,\ldots ,q_t\) and \(r_1,\ldots ,r_u\) are prime powers with \(q_i\equiv 1\ (\mathrm{mod}\ 4)\) and \(r_i\equiv 1\ (\mathrm{mod}\ 4)\) for all \(i, s_1,\ldots ,s_w\) are integers with \(1\le s_i \le 33\) or \(s_i\in \{39,43\}\) for all \(i, x\) is a positive integer such that \(2x-1\) or \(4x-1\) is a prime power. Moreover, \(\delta =1\) if \(x>1\) and \(c+s>0, \delta =0\) otherwise, \(\epsilon =1\) if \(x=1, c+s=0\) , and \(t+u+w>0, \epsilon =0\) otherwise. We also obtain some necessary conditions for the existence of \((2m,2,2m,m)\) relative difference sets in partial semidirect products of \(\mathbb{Z }_4\) with abelian groups, and provide a table cases for which \(m\le 100\) and the existence of such relative difference sets is open.     

Characterization of ellipses as uniformly dense sets with respect to a family of convex bodies

Let \(K\subset \mathbb R ^N\) be a convex body containing the origin. A measurable set \(G\subset \mathbb R ^N\) with positive Lebesgue measure is said to be uniformly \(K\) -dense if, for any fixed \(r>0\) , the measure of \(G\cap (x+r K)\) is constant when \(x\) varies on the boundary of \(G\) (here, \(x+r K\) denotes a translation of a dilation of \(K\) ). We first prove that \(G\) must always be strictly convex and at least \(C^{1,1}\) -regular; also, if \(K\) is centrally symmetric, \(K\) must be strictly convex, \(C^{1,1}\) -regular and such that \(K=G-G\) up to homotheties; this implies in turn that \(G\) must be \(C^{2,1}\) -regular. Then for \(N=2\) , we prove that \(G\) is uniformly \(K\) -dense if and only if \(K\) and \(G\) are homothetic to the same ellipse. This result was already proven by Amar et al. in 2008 . However, our proof removes their regularity assumptions on \(K\) and \(G\) , and more importantly, it is susceptible to be generalized to higher dimension since, by the use of Minkowski’s inequality and an affine inequality, avoids the delicate computations of the higher-order terms in the Taylor expansion near \(r=0\) for the measure of \(G\cap (x+r\,K)\) (needed in 2008).     

On the commuting probability and supersolvability of finite groups

For a finite group \(G\) , let \(d(G)\) denote the probability that a randomly chosen pair of elements of \(G\) commute. We prove that if \(d(G)>1/s\) for some integer \(s>1\) and \(G\) splits over an abelian normal nontrivial subgroup \(N\) , then \(G\) has a nontrivial conjugacy class inside \(N\) of size at most \(s-1\) . We also extend two results of Barry, MacHale, and Ní Shé on the commuting probability in connection with supersolvability of finite groups. In particular, we prove that if \(d(G)>5/16\) then either \(G\) is supersolvable, or \(G\) isoclinic to \(A_4\) , or \(G/\mathbf{Z}(G)\) is isoclinic to \(A_4\) .     

On the maximum size of Erdős-Ko-Rado sets in H(2d+1, q^2)

Erd?s-Ko-Rado sets in finite classical polar spaces are sets of generators that intersect pairwise non-trivially. We improve the known upper bound for Erd?s-Ko-Rado sets in \(H(2d+1, q^2)\) for \(d>2\) and \(d\) even from approximately \(q^{d^2+d}\) to \(q^{d^2+1}.\)      

Scattered linear sets generated by collineations between pencils of lines

Let \(A\) and \(B\) be two points of \(\mathrm{{PG}}(2,q^n)\) , and let \(\Phi \) be a collineation between the pencils of lines with vertices \(A\) and \(B\) . In this paper, we prove that the set of points of intersection of corresponding lines under \(\Phi \) is either the union of a scattered \(\mathrm{{GF}}(q)\) -linear set of rank \(n+1\) with the line \(AB\) or the union of \(q-1\) scattered \(\mathrm{{GF}}(q)\) -linear sets of rank \(n\) with \(A\) and \(B\) . We also determine the intersection configurations of two scattered \(\mathrm{{GF}}(q)\) -linear sets of rank \(n+1\) of \(\mathrm{{PG}}(2,q^n)\) both meeting the line \(AB\) in a \(\mathrm{{GF}}(q)\) -linear set of pseudoregulus type with transversal points \(A\) and \(B\) .     

Fully inert subgroups of free Abelian groups

A subgroup \(H\) of an Abelian group \(G\) is called fully inert if \((\phi H + H)/H\) is finite for every \(\phi \in \mathrm{End}(G)\) . Fully inert subgroups of free Abelian groups are characterized. It is proved that \(H\) is fully inert in the free group \(G\) if and only if it is commensurable with \(n G\) for some \(n \ge 0\) , that is, \((H + nG)/H\) and \((H + nG)/nG\) are both finite. From this fact we derive a more structural characterization of fully inert subgroups \(H\) of free groups \(G\) , in terms of the Ulm–Kaplansky invariants of \(G/H\) and the Hill–Megibben invariants of the exact sequence \(0 \rightarrow H \rightarrow G \rightarrow G/H \rightarrow 0\) .     

New M-ary sequences with low autocorrelation from interleaved technique

Let \(p\) and \(q\) be two odd primes with \(p=Mf+1\) and \(M\) is even. A new construction of \(M\) -ary sequences of period \(pq\) with low periodic autocorrelation is presented in this paper based on interleaving the \(M\) -ary power residue sequence of period \(p\) according to the quadratic residue with respect to \(q\) . This construction can generate the well-known twin-prime sequence and generalized cyclotomy sequence of order two if \(M=2\) . For \(M=4\) , a new class of quaternary sequences of period \(pq\) with maximal nontrivial autocorrelation value being either \(\sqrt{5}\) or \(3\) is obtained. This achieves the best known results for such kind of quaternary sequences.     

Low Complexity Methods For Discretizing Manifolds Via Riesz Energy Minimization

Let \(A\) be a compact \(d\) -rectifiable set embedded in Euclidean space \({\mathbb R}^p, d\le p\) . For a given continuous distribution \(\sigma (x)\) with respect to a \(d\) -dimensional Hausdorff measure on \(A\) , our earlier results provided a method for generating \(N\) -point configurations on \(A\) that have an asymptotic distribution \(\sigma (x)\) as \(N\rightarrow \infty \) ; moreover, such configurations are “quasi-uniform” in the sense that the ratio of the covering radius to the separation distance is bounded independently of \(N\) . The method is based upon minimizing the energy of \(N\) particles constrained to \(A\) interacting via a weighted power-law potential \(w(x,y)|x-y|^{-s}\) , where \(s>d\) is a fixed parameter and \(w(x,y)=\left( \sigma (x)\sigma (y)\right) ^{-({s}/{2d})}\) . Here we show that one can generate points on \(A\) with the aforementioned properties keeping in the energy sums only those pairs of points that are located at a distance of at most \(r_N=C_N N^{-1/d}\) from each other, with \(C_N\) being a positive sequence tending to infinity arbitrarily slowly. To do this, we minimize the energy with respect to a varying truncated weight \(v_N(x,y)=\Phi (|x-y|/r_N)\cdot w(x,y)\) , where \(\Phi :(0,\infty )\rightarrow [0,\infty )\) is a bounded function with \(\Phi (t)=0, t\ge 1\) , and \(\lim _{t\rightarrow 0^+}\Phi (t)=1\) . Under appropriate assumptions, this reduces the complexity of generating \(N\) -point “low energy” discretizations to order \(N C_N^d\) computations.     

Mean Squared Error Minimization for Inverse Moment Problems

We consider the problem of approximating the unknown density \(u\in L^2(\Omega ,\lambda )\) of a measure \(\mu \) on \(\Omega \subset \mathbb {R}^n\) , absolutely continuous with respect to some given reference measure \(\lambda \) , only from the knowledge of finitely many moments of \(\mu \) . Given \(d\in \mathbb {N}\) and moments of order \(d\) , we provide a polynomial \(p_d\) which minimizes the mean square error \(\int (u-p)^2d\lambda \) over all polynomials \(p\) of degree at most \(d\) . If there is no additional requirement, \(p_d\) is obtained as solution of a linear system. In addition, if \(p_d\) is expressed in the basis of polynomials that are orthonormal with respect to \(\lambda \) , its vector of coefficients is just the vector of given moments and no computation is needed. Moreover \(p_d\rightarrow u\) in \(L^2(\Omega ,\lambda )\) as \(d\rightarrow \infty \) . In general nonnegativity of \(p_d\) is not guaranteed even though \(u\) is nonnegative. However, with this additional nonnegativity requirement one obtains analogous results but computing \(p_d\ge 0\) that minimizes \(\int (u-p)^2d\lambda \) now requires solving an appropriate semidefinite program. We have tested the approach on some applications arising from the reconstruction of geometrical objects and the approximation of solutions of nonlinear differential equations. In all cases our results are significantly better than those obtained with the maximum entropy technique for estimating \(u\) .     

A sufficient condition for zero entropy

We prove that a diffeomorphism \(f\) defined on a compact manifold has zero topological entropy if there are \(d\in {\mathbb {N}}\) and \(K>0\) such that \(\Vert Dg^{n_x}(x)\Vert \le Kn^d_x\) for every diffeomorphism \(g\) that is \(C^1\) close to \(f\) and every periodic point \(x\) of least period \(n_x\) of \(g\) .     

SFT-stability and Krull dimension in power series rings over an almost pseudo-valuation domain

Let \(R\) be an APVD with maximal ideal \(M\) . We show that the power series ring \(R[[x_1,\ldots ,x_n]]\) is an SFT-ring if and only if the integral closure of \(R\) is an SFT-ring if and only if ( \(R\) is an SFT-ring and \(M\) is a Noether strongly primary ideal of \((M:M)\) ). We deduce that if \(R\) is an \(m\) -dimensional APVD that is a residually *-domain, then dim \(R[[x_1,\ldots ,x_n]]\,=\,nm+1\) or \(nm+n\) .     

Additive mappings satisfying algebraic conditions in rings

Let \(R\) be any \((n+1)!\) -torsion free ring and \(F,D: R\rightarrow R\) be additive mappings satisfying \(F(x^{n+1})=(\alpha (x))^nF(x)+\sum \nolimits _{i=1}^n (\alpha (x))^{n-i}(\beta (x))^iD(x)\) for all \(x\in R\) , where \(n\) is a fixed integer and \(\alpha \) , \(\beta \) are automorphisms of \(R\) . Then, \(D\) is Jordan left \((\alpha , \beta )\) -derivation and \(F\) is generalized Jordan left \((\alpha , \beta )\) -derivation on \(R\) and if additive mappings \(F\) and \(D\) satisfying \(F(x^{n+1})=F(x)(\alpha (x))^n+\sum \nolimits _{i=1}^n (\beta (x))^iD(x)(\alpha (x))^{n-i}\) for all \(x\in R\) . Then, \(D\) is Jordan \((\alpha , \beta )\) -derivation and \(F\) is generalized Jordan \((\alpha , \beta )\) -derivation on \(R\) . At last some immediate consequences of the above theorems have been given.     

Combinatorial solutions providing improved security for the generalized Russian cards problem

We present the first formal mathematical presentation of the generalized Russian cards problem, and provide rigorous security definitions that capture both basic and extended versions of weak and perfect security notions. In the generalized Russian cards problem, three players, Alice, Bob, and Cathy, are dealt a deck of \(n\) cards, each given \(a\) , \(b\) , and \(c\) cards, respectively. The goal is for Alice and Bob to learn each other’s hands via public communication, without Cathy learning the fate of any particular card. The basic idea is that Alice announces a set of possible hands she might hold, and Bob, using knowledge of his own hand, should be able to learn Alice’s cards from this announcement, but Cathy should not. Using a combinatorial approach, we are able to give a nice characterization of informative strategies (i.e., strategies allowing Bob to learn Alice’s hand), having optimal communication complexity, namely the set of possible hands Alice announces must be equivalent to a large set of \(t-(n, a, 1)\) -designs, where \(t=a-c\) . We also provide some interesting necessary conditions for certain types of deals to be simultaneously informative and secure. That is, for deals satisfying \(c = a-d\) for some \(d \ge 2\) , where \(b \ge d-1\) and the strategy is assumed to satisfy a strong version of security (namely perfect \((d-1)\) -security), we show that \(a = d+1\) and hence \(c=1\) . We also give a precise characterization of informative and perfectly \((d-1)\) -secure deals of the form \((d+1, b, 1)\) satisfying \(b \ge d-1\) involving \(d-(n, d+1, 1)\) -designs.     

Higher derivations and commutativity in lattice-ordered rings

In 1978 I. N. Herstein proved that a prime ring \(R\) of characteristic not two with nonzero derivation \(d\) satisfying \(d(x)d(y)=d(y)d(x)\) for all \(x,y\in R\) is commutative, and in 1995 Bell and Daif showed that \(d(xy)=d(yx)\) implies commutativity. We extend the Bell–Daif theorem to lattice-ordered prime rings with a positive derivation satisfying the property on a one-sided \(L\) -ideal and interpret these conditions for higher derivations in prime \(d\) -rings and in semiprime \(f\) -rings. Our key tool is that every positive derivation nilpotent on a one-sided \(L\) -ideal of a semiprime \(\ell \) -ring is zero on that ideal.     

Minimum total coloring of planar graph

Graph coloring is an important tool in the study of optimization, computer science, network design, e.g., file transferring in a computer network, pattern matching, computation of Hessians matrix and so on. In this paper, we consider one important coloring, vertex coloring of a total graph, which is familiar to us by the name of “total coloring”. Total coloring is a coloring of \(V\cup {E}\) such that no two adjacent or incident elements receive the same color. In other words, total chromatic number of \(G\) is the minimum number of disjoint vertex independent sets covering a total graph of \(G\) . Here, let \(G\) be a planar graph with \(\varDelta \ge 8\) . We proved that if for every vertex \(v\in V\) , there exists two integers \(i_{v},j_{v} \in \{3,4,5,6,7,8\}\) such that \(v\) is not incident with intersecting \(i_v\) -cycles and \(j_v\) -cycles, then the vertex chromatic number of total graph of \(G\) is \(\varDelta +1\) , i.e., the total chromatic number of \(G\) is \(\varDelta +1\) .     

Endomorphism rings of bimodules

Let \(M\) be an \(R\) - \(R\) -bimodule over a semi-prime right and left Goldie ring \(R\) . We investigate how non-singularity conditions on \(M_R\) are related to such conditions on \(_RM\) . In particular, we say an \(R\) - \(R\) -bimodule \(M\) such that \(_RM\) and \(M_R\) are non-singular has the right essentiality property if \(IM_R\) is essential in \(M_R\) for all essential right ideals \(I\) of \(R\) , and investigate several questions related to this property.