In the paper (Ferrara Dentice et al., 2004) a complete exposition of the state of the art for lax embeddings of polar spaces of finite rank $\ge 3$ is presented. As a consequence, we have that if a Grassmann space $G$ of dimension 3 and index 1 has a lax embedding in a projective space over a skew–field $K$, then $G$ is the Klein quadric defined over a subfield of $K$. In this paper, I examine Grassmann spaces of arbitrary dimension $d\ge 3$ and index $h\ge 1$ having a lax embedding in a projective space.

Let $k$ be an algebraically closed field of characteristic $p\>0$. We study obstructions to lifting to characteristic $0$ the faithful continuous action $\phi$ of a finite group $G$ on $k\left[\right[t\left]\right]$. To each such $\phi$ a theorem of Katz and Gabber associates an action of $G$ on a smooth projective curve $Y$ over $k$. We say that the KGB obstruction of $\phi$ vanishes if $G$ acts on a smooth projective curve $X$ in characteristic $0$ in such a way that $X/H$ and $Y/H$ have the same genus for all subgroups $H\subset G$. We determine for which $G$ the KGB...

Let $Y$ be an $(m+1)$-dimensional irreducible smooth complex projective variety embedded in a projective space. Let $Z$ be a closed subscheme of $Y$, and $\delta$ be a positive integer such that ${ℐ}_{Z,Y}\left(\delta \right)$ is generated by global sections. Fix an integer $d\ge \delta +1$, and assume the general divisor $X\in |H^0(Y,{ℐ}_{Z,Y}\left(d\right))|$ is smooth. Denote by $H^m{(X;\mathbb{Q})}_{\perp Z}^{\mathrm{van}}$ the quotient of $H^m(X;\mathbb{Q})$ by the cohomology of $Y$ and also by the cycle classes of the irreducible components of dimension $m$ of $Z$. In the present paper we prove that the monodromy representation on $H^m{(X;\mathbb{Q})}_{\perp Z}^{\mathrm{van}}$ for the family...

Using the geometry of the projective plane over the finite field ${𝔽}_q$, we construct a Hermitian Lorentzian lattice $L_q$ of dimension $(q^2+q+2)$ defined over a certain number ring $𝒪$ that depends on $q$. We show that infinitely many of these lattices are $p$-modular, that is, $p{L}_q^{\text{'}}=L_q$, where $p$ is some prime in $𝒪$ such that ${\left|p\right|}^2=q$. The Lorentzian lattices $L_q$ sometimes lead to construction of interesting positive definite lattices. In particular, if $q\equiv 3mod4$ is a rational prime such that $(q^2+q+1)$ is norm of some element in...

Let $G$ be a finite group and $p$ a prime number. We prove that if $G$ is a finite group of order $\left|\mathrm{PSL}\right(2,p^2\left)\right|$ such that $G$ has an irreducible character of degree $p^2$ and we know that $G$ has no irreducible character $\theta$ such that $2p\mid \theta \left(1\right)$, then $G$ is isomorphic to $\mathrm{PSL}(2,p^2)$. As a consequence of our result we prove that $\mathrm{PSL}(2,p^2)$ is uniquely determined by the structure of its complex group algebra.

Given an integer $n\ge 3$, let $u_1,...,u_n$ be pairwise coprime integers $\ge 2$, $𝒟$ a family of nonempty proper subsets of $\{1,...,n\}$ with “enough” elements, and $\epsilon$ a function $𝒟\to \{\pm 1\}$. Does there exist at least one prime $q$ such that $q$ divides ${\prod }_{i\in I}{u}_i-\epsilon \left(I\right)$ for some $I\in 𝒟$, but it does not divide $u_1\cdots u_n$? We answer this question in the positive when the $u_i$ are prime powers and $\epsilon$ and $𝒟$ are subjected to certain restrictions. We use the result to prove that, if ${\epsilon }_0\in \{\pm 1\}$ and $A$ is a set of three or more primes that contains all prime divisors of any...

Let $G$ be a group and $\omega \left(G\right)$ be the set of element orders of $G$. Let $k\in \omega \left(G\right)$ and $m_k\left(G\right)$ be the number of elements of order $k$ in $G$. Let nse$\left(G\right)=\{m_k\left(G\right):k\in \omega \left(G\right)\}$. Assume $r$ is a prime number and let $G$ be a group such that nse$\left(G\right)=$ nse$\left(S_r\right)$, where $S_r$ is the symmetric group of degree $r$. In this paper we prove that $G\cong S_r$, if $r$ divides the order of $G$ and $r^2$ does not divide it. To get the conclusion we make use of some well-known results on the prime graphs of finite simple groups and their components.

It is proved that real functions on $ℝ$ which can be represented as the difference of two semiconvex functions with a general modulus (or of two lower $C^1$-functions, or of two strongly paraconvex functions) coincide with semismooth functions on $ℝ$ (i.e. those locally Lipschitz functions on $ℝ$ for which $f_{+}^{\text{'}}\left(x\right)={lim}_{t\to x+}{f}_{+}^{\text{'}}\left(t\right)$ and $f_{-}^{\text{'}}\left(x\right)={lim}_{t\to x-}{f}_{-}^{\text{'}}\left(t\right)$ for each $x$). Further, for each modulus $\omega$, we characterize the class $DS{C}_{\omega }$ of functions on $ℝ$ which can be written as $f=g-h$, where $g$ and $h$ are semiconvex with modulus $C\omega$ (for some $C>0$) using a new...

A graph $X$, with a group $G$ of automorphisms of $X$, is said to be $(G,s)$-transitive, for some $s\ge 1$, if $G$ is transitive on $s$-arcs but not on $(s+1)$-arcs. Let $X$ be a connected $(G,s)$-transitive graph of prime valency $p\ge 5$, and $G_v$ the vertex stabilizer of a vertex $v\in V\left(X\right)$. Suppose that $G_v$ is solvable. Weiss (1974) proved that $|G_v{|\mid p(p-1)}^2$. In this paper, we prove that $G_v\cong ({\mathbb{Z}}_p⋊{\mathbb{Z}}_m)\times {\mathbb{Z}}_n$ for some positive integers $m$ and $n$ such that $ndivm$ and $m\mid p-1$.

Let $X$ be a uniruled projective manifold and let $x$ be a general point. The main result of [2] says that if the $(-K_X)$-degrees (i.e., the degrees with respect to the anti-canonical bundle of $X$) of all rational curves through $x$ are at least $dimX+1$, then $X$ is a projective space. In this paper, we study the structure of $X$ when the $(-K_X)$-degrees of all rational curves through $x$ are at least $dimX$. Our study uses the projective variety ${𝒞}_x\subset \mathbb{P}{T}_x\left(X\right)$, called the VMRT at $x$, defined as the union of tangent directions to the...

In this paper we prove the following theorems in incidence geometry. 1. There is $\delta >0$ such that for any $P_1,\cdots ,P_4$, and $Q_1,\cdots ,Q_n\in {ℂ}^2$, if there are $\le n^{(1+\delta )/2}$ many distinct lines between $P_i$ and $Q_j$ for all $i$, $j$, then $P_1,\cdots ,P_4$ are collinear. If the number of the distinct lines is $<c{n}^{1/2}$ then the cross ratio of the four points is algebraic. 2. Given $c>0$, there is $\delta >0$ such that for any $P_1,P_2,P_3\in {ℂ}^2$ noncollinear, and $Q_1,\cdots ,Q_n\in {ℂ}^2$, if there are $\le c{n}^{1/2}$ many distinct lines between $P_i$ and $Q_j$ for all $i$, $j$, then for any $P\in {ℂ}^2\setminus \{P_1,P_2,P_3\}$, we have $\delta n$ distinct lines between $P$ and $Q_j$. 3. Given...

Let $\Omega$ be a bounded domain of class $C^2$ in $ℝ$N and let $K$ be a compact subset of $\partial \Omega$. Assume that $q\ge (N+1)/\left(N-1\right)$ and denote by $U_K$ the maximal solution of $-\Delta u+u^q=0$ in $\Omega$ which vanishes on $\partial \Omega \setminus K$. We obtain sharp upper and lower estimates for $U_K$ in terms of the Bessel capacity $C_{2/q,q^{\text{'}}}$ and prove that $U_K$ is $\sigma$-moderate. In addition we describe the precise asymptotic behavior of $U_K$ at points $\sigma \in K$, which depends on the “density” of $K$ at $\sigma$, measured in terms of the capacity $C_{2/q,q^{\text{'}}}$.

In this paper, we examine a natural question concerning the divisors of the polynomial $x^n-1$: “How often does $x^n-1$ have a divisor of every degree between $1$ and $n$?” In a previous paper, we considered the situation when $x^n-1$ is factored in $\mathbb{Z}\left[x\right]$. In this paper, we replace $\mathbb{Z}\left[x\right]$ with ${𝔽}_p\left[x\right]$, where $p$ is an arbitrary-but-fixed prime. We also consider those $n$ where this condition holds for all $p$.

Let $\mathbb{Z}$ be the set of integers, ${\mathbb{N}}_0$ the set of nonnegative integers and $F(x_1,x_2)=u_1{x}_1+u_2{x}_2$ be a binary linear form whose coefficients $u_1$, $u_2$ are nonzero, relatively prime integers such that $u_1{u}_2\ne \pm 1$ and $u_1{u}_2\ne -2$. Let $f:\mathbb{Z}\to {\mathbb{N}}_0\cup \left\{\infty \right\}$ be any function such that the set $f^{-1}\left(0\right)$ has asymptotic density zero. In 2007, M. B. Nathanson (2007) proved that there exists a set $A$ of integers such that $r_{A,F}\left(n\right)=f\left(n\right)$ for all integers $n$, where $r_{A,F}\left(n\right)=\left|\{(a,a^{\text{'}}):n=u_{1}a+u_2{a}^{\text{'}}:a,a^{\text{'}}\in A\}\right|$. We add the structure of difference for the binary linear form $F(x_1,x_2)$.