Questions tagged [combinatorial-designs]

Design theory is the subfield of combinatorics concerning the existence and construction of highly symmetric arrangements. Finite projective planes, latin squares, and Steiner triple systems are examples of designs.

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More about self-complementary block designs

For what odd integers $n \geq 3$ does there exist a self-complementary $(2n,8n−4,4n−2,n,2n−2)$ balanced incomplete block design? By "self-complementary" I mean that the complement of each block is a ...
James Propp's user avatar
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Tenacious structure

Let $\def\A{\mathbb A}\def\F{\mathbb F}\F_3$ be the Galois field with three elements and let $\A^d=\A^d(\F_3)$ be the affine space of dimension $d$ over $\mathbb F_3$ —the subject is combinatorics and ...
Mariano Suárez-Álvarez's user avatar
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A generalization of covering designs and lottery wheels

This question is inspired by a recent problem . A $(v,k,t)$ covering design is a pair $(V,B)$ where $V$ is a set of $v$ points and $B$ is a family of $k$ point subsets (called blocks) such that ...
Aaron Meyerowitz's user avatar
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The existence of big incompatible families of weight supports

In 2018 Mario Krenn posed this originated from recent advances in quantum physics question on a maximum number of colors of a monochromatic graph with $n$ vertices. Despite very intensive Krenn’s ...
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Software reference for combinatorial design

If one were to require quick and easy access to sizeable latin squares, room squares, Steiner systems, designs, balanced block designs... where to look, what software to use?
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Existence of finite 3-dimensional hyperbolic balanced geometry

Together with @TarasBanakh we faced the problem described in the title. Let me start with definitions. A linear space is a pair $(S,\mathcal L)$ consisting of a set $S$ and a family $\mathcal L$ of ...
Ihromant's user avatar
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Existence of a block design

Let $\ell$ be an integer parameter. I want to ask the existence of the following design: There is a universal constant $\beta < 1$ such that for all sufficiently large $\ell$, the following holds: ...
Xi Wu's user avatar
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Reduction argument from a general vertex set V(G) to a prime power in Prof. Keevash's proof on the Existence of Designs

The proof flow of the paper "On the Existence of Designs" by Prof. Keevash as I understand it is the following: -- Reduction from the general case to $V = \mathbb{F}_{p^a}$ (Lemma 6.3) -- Covering ...
Sankeerth's user avatar
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Number of cyclic difference sets

A subset $D=\{a_1,\ldots,a_k\}$ of $\mathbb{Z}/v\mathbb{Z}$ is said to be a $(v,k,\lambda)$-cycic difference set if for each nonzero $b\in\mathbb{Z}/v\mathbb{Z}$, there are exactly $\lambda$ ordered ...
Binzhou Xia's user avatar
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Cliques in Incomplete block designs

I'm interested in inequalities that guarantee the presence of cliques in incomplete block designs. Here's the set-up: I have an incidence structure $(V, B)$ which is an incomplete block design: $V$ is ...
Nick Gill's user avatar
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Linear combinations of special matrices

I am a hobby computer scientist and I have a problem to which I am searching an efficient algorithm. Given an integer n, we want to combine some square input-matrices of size n in a way that is ...
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Graeco-Latin squares and outer-automorphisms

It is well known that $n=6$ is the only number greater than two in which there is no Graeco-Latin square of order $n$. It is also well known that $n=6$ is the only number greater than two in which ...
Craig Feinstein's user avatar
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what is the largest real orthogonal design in $n$ variables?

A real orthogonal design in $n$ variables is an $m \times n$ matrix with entries from the set $\pm x_1,\pm x_2,\cdots,\pm x_n$ that satisfies : $$ A A^T = (x_1^2 + x_2^2 + \cdots x_n^2) I_m $$ ...
unknown's user avatar
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A question on the behavior of intersections of certain block design

Let $[d]$ be a universe and $S_1, \dots, S_m$ be an $(\ell, a)$-design over $[d]$ which means that: $\forall i \in [m], S_i \subseteq [d], |S_i|=\ell$. $\forall i \neq j \in [m]$, $|S_i \cap S_j| \...
Xi Wu's user avatar
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Packings with block size equal to $6$?

In design theory the following is the defintion of a packing : Definition : A $(v,k)$-packing is a pair $(V, \mathcal{B})$ of a finite set $V$ of cardinality $\vert V \vert = v$ and a finite set $\...
Elaqqad's user avatar
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A generalization of PBIBDs

A PBIBD is an incidence structure together with an underlying symmetric association scheme. One can relax the symmetry requirement, and ask for incidence structures with an underlying (not necessarily ...
DKal's user avatar
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Non-uniform Ray-Chaudhuri-Wilson (generalized Fisher's inequality)

A $t$-design on $v$ points with block size and index $\lambda$ is a collection $\mathcal{B}$ of subsets of a set $V$ with $v$ elements satisfying the following properties: (a) every $B\in\mathcal{B}$ ...
H A Helfgott's user avatar
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Point sets with tangents through every point

Let $D=(P,L)$ be either a $(v,k,\lambda)$-design or a near-linear space (or, more generally, any incidence structure with "points" and sets of points which are called "blocks" or "lines") and let $S \...
Felix Goldberg's user avatar
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On a combinatorial design inspired by a football (soccer) tournament

Real-world inspiration. My younger son was playing a micro football (soccer) tournament this afternoon with $3$ other friends. Let's label the $4$ kids $0,1,2,3$. They played $3$ matches: $\{0,1\} \...
Dominic van der Zypen's user avatar
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Are sharper lower bounds known for these potentials on the sphere?

Fix a positive integer $\ell$. For $x_1,\dotsc,x_n\in S^{d-1}$, Venkov proved that $$ \sum_{i=1}^n\sum_{j=1}^n(x_i\cdot x_j)^{2\ell}\geq\frac{(2\ell-1)!!(d-2)!!}{(d+2\ell-2)!!}\cdot n^2, $$ with ...
Dustin G. Mixon's user avatar
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Optimal choice of points to maximize majorities in a $t-(v,k,\lambda)$ design

Let us consider a design $\mathcal{D} = (V,\mathcal{B})$ with points in $V$ and blocks in $\mathcal{B}$. I am interested in the special case of a $t-(v,k,\lambda)$ design for $k=3$, i.e., all blocks ...
mgus's user avatar
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Minimal m such that m x K_n is decomposable into disjoint C_3

For a given $n$, is there a way to calculate the minimal value $m$ such that you can decompose the multigraph: $$m \times K_n$$ into disjoint 3-cycles? What about a more general result applied to ...
Sebastian's user avatar
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Bounds for smallest non-trivial designs

Given $s>t\ge 2$, let $N(s,t)$ be the smallest integer $n>s$ such that there exists an “$(n;s;t;1)$-design” (i.e., a collection of $s$-subsets $e_1,\dots,e_m$ of $[n]:=\{1,\dots,n\}$, such that ...
Zach Hunter's user avatar
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Steiner-like systems with large edges and many intersections

Let $l\geq 3$ be an integer. Is there $n\in\mathbb{N}$ and a hypergraph $H=(\{1,\ldots,n\},E)$ with the following properties? for all $e\in E$ we have $|e| \geq l$ $e_1\neq e_2 \in E \implies |e_1 \...
Dominic van der Zypen's user avatar
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Non-continuous behaviour when designing a repeated experiment

Assume one can perform measurements of an unknown quantity $\theta$ as $$y = \theta + \epsilon(t),$$ where $\epsilon(t) \sim \mathcal{N}(0,1/t)$ is the measurement error when a time $t$ was spent to ...
guigux's user avatar
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