On the simple connectedness of hyperplane complements in dual polar spaces

Let Δ be a dual polar space of rank n≥4, H be a hyperplane of Δ and Γ?Δ?H be the complement of H in Δ. We shall prove that, if all lines of Δ have more than 3 points, then Γ is simply connected. Then we show how this theorem can be exploited to prove that certain families of hyperplanes of dual polar spaces, or all hyperplanes of certain dual polar spaces, arise from embeddings.     

Simple connectedness of hyperplane complements in some geometries related to buildings

For a class of parapolar spaces that includes the geometries E6,4, E7,7, and E8,1 with lines of size at least three, the metasymplectic spaces with lines of size at least four, and the polar line Grassmannians with lines of size at least four except D4,2(3), we show that the subgraph of the point-collinearity graph induced on the complement of a hyperplane is simply connected. We also show that these parapolar spaces have Veldkamp lines.     

On geometric SDPS-sets of elliptic dual polar spaces

Let n∈N?{0,1} and let K and K^′ be fields such that K^′ is a quadratic Galois extension of K. Let Q⁻(2n+1,K) be a nonsingular quadric of Witt index n in PG(2n+1,K) whose associated quadratic form defines a nonsingular quadric Q⁺(2n+1,K^′) of Witt index n+1 in PG(2n+1,K^′). For even n, we define a class of SDPS-sets of the dual polar space DQ⁻(2n+1,K) associated to Q⁻(2n+1,K), and call its members geometric SDPS-sets. We show that geometric SDPS-sets of DQ⁻(2n+1,K) are unique up to isomorphism and that they all arise from the spin embedding of DQ⁻(2n+1,K). We will use geometric SDPS-sets to describe the structure of the natural embedding of DQ⁻(2n+1,K) into one of the half-spin geometries for Q⁺(2n+1,K^′).     

Valuations and hyperplanes of dual polar spaces

Valuations were introduced in De Bruyn and Vandecasteele (Valuations of near polygons,preprint, 2004) as a very important tool for classifying near polygons. In the present paper we study valuations of dual polar spaces. We will introduce the class of the SDPS-valuations and characterize these valuations. We will show that a valuation of a finite thick dual polar space is the extension of an SDPS-valuation if and only if no induced hex valuation is ovoidal or semi-classical. Each SDPS-valuation will also give rise to a geometric hyperplane of the dual polar space.     

Two classes of hyperplanes of dual polar spaces without subquadrangular quads

Let Π be one of the following polar spaces: (i) a nondegenerate polar space of rank n−1?2 which is embedded as a hyperplane in Q(2n,K); (ii) a nondegenerate polar space of rank n?2 which contains Q(2n,K) as a hyperplane. Let Δ and DQ(2n,K) denote the dual polar spaces associated with Π and Q(2n,K), respectively. We show that every locally singular hyperplane of DQ(2n,K) gives rise to a hyperplane of Δ without subquadrangular quads. Suppose Π is associated with a nonsingular quadric Q⁻(2n+?,K) of PG(2n+?,K), ?∈{−1,1}, described by a quadratic form of Witt-index , which becomes a quadratic form of Witt-index when regarded over a quadratic Galois extension of K. Then we show that the constructed hyperplanes of Δ arise from embedding.     

Minimal full polarized embeddings of dual polar spaces

Let Δ be a thick dual polar space of rank n ≥ 2 admitting a full polarized embedding e in a finite-dimensional projective space Σ, i.e., for every point x of Δ, e maps the set of points of Δ at non-maximal distance from x into a hyperplane e∗(x) of Σ. Using a result of Kasikova and Shult [11], we are able the show that there exists up to isomorphisms a unique full polarized embedding of Δ of minimal dimension. We also show that e∗ realizes a full polarized embedding of Δ into a subspace of the dual of Σ, and that e∗ is isomorphic to the minimal full polarized embedding of Δ. In the final section, we will determine the minimal full polarized embeddings of the finite dual polar spaces DQ(2n,q), DQ ⁻(2n+1,q), DH(2n−1,q ²) and DW(2n−1,q) (q odd), but the latter only for n≤ 5. We shall prove that the minimal full polarized embeddings of DQ(2n,q), DQ ⁻(2n+1,q) and DH(2n−1,q ²) are the `natural' ones, whereas this is not always the case for DW(2n−1, q).B. De Bruyn: Postdoctoral Fellow of the Research Foundation - Flanders.     

Metric characterization of apartments in dual polar spaces

Let Π be a polar space of rank n and let Gk(Π), k∈{0,…,n−1} be the polar Grassmannian formed by k-dimensional singular subspaces of Π. The corresponding Grassmann graph will be denoted by Γk(Π). We consider the polar Grassmannian Gn−1(Π) formed by maximal singular subspaces of Π and show that the image of every isometric embedding of the n-dimensional hypercube graph Hn in Γn−1(Π) is an apartment of Gn−1(Π). This follows from a more general result concerning isometric embeddings of Hm, m?n in Γn−1(Π). As an application, we classify all isometric embeddings of Γn−1(Π) in Γn^′−1(Π^′), where Π^′ is a polar space of rank n^′?n.     

On Small and Large Hyperplanes of DW(5, q)

We determine lower and upper bounds for the size of a hyperplane of the dual polar space DW(5, q). In some cases, we also determine all hyperplanes attaining these bounds.     

The combinatorial properties of the hyperplanes of DW(5, q) arising from embedding

In De Bruyn Discrete math(to appear), one of the authors proved that there are six isomorphism classes of hyperplanes in the dual polar space DW(5, q), q even, which arise from its Grassmann-embedding. In the present paper, we determine the combinatorial properties of these hyperplanes. Specifically, for each such hyperplane H we calculate the number of quads Q for which is a certain configuration of points in Q and the number of points for which is a certain configuration of points in . By purely combinatorial techniques, we are also able to show that the set of hyperplanes of DW(5, q), q odd, which arise from its Grassmann-embedding can be divided into six subclasses if one takes only into account the above-mentioned combinatorial properties. A complete classification of all hyperplanes of DW(5, q), q odd, which arise from its Grassmann-embedding, i.e. the division of the above-mentioned six classes into isomorphism classes, will unlike in De Bruyn (to appear) most likely need a group-theoretical approach. Postdoctoral Fellow of the Research Foundation—Flanders (Belgium).     

On symplectic polar spaces over non-perfect fields of characteristic 2

Given a field 𝕂 of characteristic 2 and an integer n ≥ 2, let W(2n ? 1, 𝕂) be the symplectic polar space defined in PG(2n ? 1, 𝕂) by a non-degenerate alternating form of V(2n, 𝕂) and let Q(2n, 𝕂) be the quadric of PG(2n, 𝕂) associated to a non-singular quadratic form of Witt index n. In the literature it is often claimed that W(2n ? 1, 𝕂) ? Q(2n, 𝕂). This is true when 𝕂 is perfect, but false otherwise. In this article, we modify the previous claim in order to obtain a statement that is correct for any field of characteristic 2. Explicitly, we prove that W(2n ? 1, 𝕂) is indeed isomorphic to a non-singular quadric Q, but when 𝕂 is non-perfect the nucleus of Q has vector dimension greater than 1. So, in this case, Q(2n, 𝕂) is a proper subgeometry of W(2n ? 1, 𝕂). We show that, in spite of this fact, W(2n ? 1, 𝕂) can be embedded in Q(2n, 𝕂) as a subgeometry and that this embedding induces a full embedding of the dual DW(2n ? 1, 𝕂) of W(2n ? 1, 𝕂) into the dual DQ(2n, 𝕂) of Q(2n, 𝕂).     

On codewords in the dual code of classical generalised quadrangles and classical polar spaces

In [J.L. Kim, K. Mellinger, L. Storme, Small weight codewords in LDPC codes defined by (dual) classical generalised quadrangles, Des. Codes Cryptogr. 42 (1) (2007) 73-92], the codewords of small weight in the dual code of the code of points and lines of Q(4,q) are characterised. Inspired by this result, using geometrical arguments, we characterise the codewords of small weight in the dual code of the code of points and generators of Q⁺(5,q) and H(5,q²), and we present lower bounds on the weight of the codewords in the dual of the code of points and k-spaces of the classical polar spaces. Furthermore, we investigate the codewords with the largest weights in these codes, where for q even and k sufficiently small, we determine the maximum weight and characterise the codewords of maximum weight. Moreover, we show that there exists an interval such that for every even number w in this interval, there is a codeword in the dual code of Q⁺(5,q), q even, with weight w and we show that there is an empty interval in the weight distribution of the dual of the code of Q(4,q), q even. To prove this, we show that a blocking set of Q(4,q), q even, of size q²+1+r, where 0<r<(q+4)/6, contains an ovoid of Q(4,q), improving on [J. Eisfeld, L. Storme, T. Sz?nyi, P. Sziklai, Covers and blocking sets of classical generalised quadrangles, Discrete Math. 238 (2001) 35-51, Theorem 9].     

Projective embeddings of dual polar spaces arising from a class of alternative division rings

We discuss some recent results of us regarding a class of polar spaces which includes the nonembeddable polar spaces introduced by Tits [Tits, J., “Buildings of spherical type and finite BN-pairs,” Lecture Notes in Mathematics 386, Springer-Verlag, Berlin-New York, 1974]. These results include an elementary construction of the polar space, a construction of a polarized embedding of the corresponding dual polar space and the determination whether this projective embedding is universal and unique (as a polarized embedding).     

A class of amply regular graphs related to the subconstituents of a dual polar graph

The connected components of the induced graphs on each subconstituent of the dual polar graph of the odd dimensional orthogonal spaces over a finite field are shown to be amply regular. The connected components of the graphs on the second and third subconstituents are shown to be distance-regular by elementary methods.