Existence of large sets of disjoint group‐divisible designs with block size three and type 2n41

Large sets of disjoint group‐divisible designs with block size three and type 2ⁿ4¹ (denoted by LS (2ⁿ4¹)) were first studied by Schellenberg and Stinson and motivated by their connection with perfect threshold schemes. It is known that such large sets can exist only for n ≡ 0 (mod 3) and do exist for any n ? {12, 36, 48, 144} ∪ {m > 6 : m ≡ 6,30 (mod 36)}. In this paper, we show that an LS (2^{12k + 6}4¹) exists for any k ≠ 2. So, the existence of LS (2ⁿ4¹) is almost solved with five possible exceptions n ∈ {12, 30, 36, 48, 144}. This solution is based on the known existence results of S (3, 4, v)s by Hanani and special S (3, {4, 6}, 6m)s by Mills. Partitionable H (q, 2, 3, 3) frames also play an important role together with a special known LS (2¹⁸4¹) with a subdesign LS (2⁶4¹). © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.