Pathological projective planes: Associate affine planes

In [7] the author showed the existence of projective plane pathological with respect to the collineation groups of its sub and quotient planes. Similar pathologies are obtainable with respect to collineation groups of associated affine planes. (i.e. the affine planes obtained by distinguishing a line as the line at infinity) as expressable in the following theorem.     

Extended dual affine planes

We study a class of diagram geometries, achieve a characterization of extended dual affine planes, and embed extended dual affine planes in extended projective planes. The geometries studied are rank 3 diagram geometries such that the residue of a point is a dual net, and the residue of a plane is linear; the dual of such a geometry has partitions on lines and planes which are reminiscent of parallelism of lines and planes of an affine 3-space. Examples of these geometries (some in dual form) include extended dual affine planes, Laguerre planes, 3-nets, and orthogonal arrays of strength 3. Theorem: Any such finite geometry satisfying Buekenhout's intersection property, and such that any two points are coplanar, is an extended dual affine plane (and has order 2, 4, or 10). Theorem: This geometry may be embedded in an extended projective plane of the same order.This research was partially supported by NSF Grant MCS-8102361.     

Near affine Hjelmslev planes

A study is made of two generalizations of affine Hjelmslev planes in which the parallel axiom is not required to hold. Integer invariants are obtained for the finite planes in these new classes. Formulas are derived which enable one to compute the cardinalities of certain subsets of points and lines in terms of the invariants, and results are obtained on the nonexistence of planes with certain sets of invariants.     

Subplane covered affine planes

Projective or affine planes that are covered by subplanes in a prescribed manner are studied and classified. This provides a generalization of the concept of regular spread.This research begun while the second author was a C.N.R. visiting professor in Italy during May–June 1994.     

On point-transitive affine planes

Finite affine planes are constructed admitting nonabelian sharply point-transitive collineation groups. These planes are of two sorts: dual translation planes, and planes of type II.1 derived from them. This research was supported in part by National Science Foundation Grant MCS-7903130.     

Ordered affine Hjelmslev planes

Preorderings and orderings of affine Hjelmslev planes were defined in [3]. The ordering of an AH-plane is shown to induce an ordering on each coordinate biternary ring which is compatible with the multiplication of the associated algebra. Even stronger projective order relations, on both the planes and biternary rings, are introduced and are shown to be also compatible with the ternary operations.The author gratefully acknowledges the support of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and the invaluable assistance of Dr. N. D. Lane, McMaster University.     

Preordered affine Hjelmslev planes

An affine Hjelmslev plane (AH-plane)H is preordered if it is endowed with a betweenness relation which is preserved by bijective parallel projections. Preordered biternary rings are defined and are used to construct preordered AH-planes. Conversely, a preordered AH-plane induces a preordering on any of its biternary rings. The concepts used in this paper are compared with those in a recent independent study of preordered affine Klingenberg planes by F. Machala. Unlike the Klingenberg case, preordered AH-planes always possess convex neighbour classes and unlike ordered ordinary affine planes, preordered AH-planes are never archimedian.The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.     

Transitive affine planes admitting elations

Affine planes which admit a point transitive collineation group and at least one affine elation are considered. Such a plane is shown to be (A,?_∞)-transitive for some point A on ?_t8 and to be a translation plane if at least two distinct elation centers exist. If the plane has at least (order)^1/2+1 distinct elation centers and the group generated by the elations is nonsolvable then the plane is either Desarguesian or Lüneburg-Tits.     

Point homogeneous flat affine planes

All flat projective planes (P,) whose automorphism group contains a 2-dimensional, connected closed subgroup fixing at most one line 1, are classified, except the following 2 classes: (1) – L₂, and not transitive on P1, and (2) S₁xR.Research supported in part by National Research Council of Canada (NRC)Herrn Professor Dr. Werner Burau zum 70. Geburtstag     

On blocking sets in affine planes

Denote by _q an affine plane of order q. In the desarguesian case _q=AG(2,q), q 5(q= p^h, p prime), we prove that the smallest cardinality of a blocking set is 2q–1. In any arbitrary affine plane _q (desarguesian or not) with q5, for any integer k with 2q–1 k(q–1)², we construct a blocking set S with ¦S¦=k. For an irreducible blocking set S of _q we determine the upper bound S [qq]+1. We prove that if _q contains a blocking set S which is irreducible with its complementary blocking set, then necessarily _q=AG(2, 4) and S is uniquely determined. Finally we introduce techniques to obtain blocking sets in AG(2, q) and in PG(2, q).Research partially supported by G.N.S.A.G.A. (CNR)     

Derived semifield planes with affine elations

Derived semifield planes admitting non trivial affine elations with more than one centre are examined in detail and several new examples of such plantes are constructed. A new characterization of the Hall planes of even order among derived semifield planes is also given.Research partially supported by G.N.S.A.G.A. (C.N.R.)