The use of blocking sets in Galois geometries and in related research areas

Blocking sets play a central role in Galois geometries. Besides their intrinsic geometrical importance, the importance of blocking sets also arises from the use of blocking sets for the solution of many other geometrical problems, and problems in related research areas. This article focusses on these applications to motivate researchers to investigate blocking sets, and to motivate researchers to investigate the problems that can be solved by using blocking sets. By showing the many applications on blocking sets, we also wish to prove that researchers who improve results on blocking sets in fact open the door to improvements on the solution of many other problems

Johnson type bounds for mixed dimension subspace codes

Subspace codes, i.e., sets of subspaces of $\mathbb{F}_q^v$, are applied in random linear network coding. Here we give improved upper bounds for their cardinalities based on the Johnson bound for constant dimension codes.Comment: 16 pages, typos correcte

Classification of large partial plane spreads in PG(6,2)PG(6,2) and related combinatorial objects

In this article, the partial plane spreads in $PG(6,2)$ of maximum possible size $17$ and of size $16$ are classified. Based on this result, we obtain the classification of the following closely related combinatorial objects: Vector space partitions of $PG(6,2)$ of type $(3^{16} 4^1)$, binary $3\times 4$ MRD codes of minimum rank distance $3$, and subspace codes with parameters $(7,17,6)_2$ and $(7,34,5)_2$.Comment: 31 pages, 9 table

Slices of the unitary spread

We prove that slices of the unitary spread of Q(+)(7, q), q equivalent to 2 (mod 3), can be partitioned into five disjoint classes. Slices belonging to different classes are non-equivalent under the action of the subgroup of P Gamma O+(8, q) fixing the unitary spread. When q is even, there is a connection between spreads of Q(+)(7, q) and symplectic 2-spreads of PG(5, q) (see Dillon, Ph.D. thesis, 1974 and Dye, Ann. Mat. Pura Appl. (4) 114, 173-194, 1977). As a consequence of the above result we determine all the possible non-equivalent symplectic 2-spreads arising from the unitary spread of Q(+)(7, q), q = 2(2h+1). Some of these already appeared in Kantor, SIAM J. Algebr. Discrete Methods 3(2), 151-165, 1982. When q = 3(h), we classify, up to the action of the stabilizer in P Gamma O(7, q) of the unitary spread of Q(6, q), those among its slices producing spreads of the elliptic quadric Q(-)(5, q)