On a hypergraph Turan problem of Frankl

Let $C^{2k}_r$ be the $2k$-uniform hypergraph obtained by letting $P_1,...,P_r$ be pairwise disjoint sets of size $k$ and taking as edges all sets $P_i \cup P_j$ with $i \neq j$. This can be thought of as the `$k$-expansion' of the complete graph $K_r$: each vertex has been replaced with a set of size $k$. We determine the exact Turan number of $C^{2k}_3$ and the corresponding extremal hypergraph, thus confirming a conjecture of Frankl. Sidorenko has given an upper bound of $(r-2) / (r-1)$ for the Tur\'an density of $C^{2k}_r$ for any $r$, and a construction establishing a matching lower bound when $r$ is of the form $2^p + 1$. We show that when $r = 2^p + 1$, any $C^4_r$-free hypergraph of density $(r-2)/(r-1) - o(1)$ looks approximately like Sidorenko's construction. On the other hand, when $r$ is not of this form, we show that corresponding constructions do not exist and improve the upper bound on the Tur\'an density of $C^4_r$ to $(r-2)/(r-1) - c(r)$, where $c(r)$ is a constant depending only on $r$. The backbone of our arguments is a strategy of first proving approximate structure theorems, and then showing that any imperfections in the structure must lead to a suboptimal configuration. The tools for its realisation draw on extremal graph theory, linear algebra, the Kruskal-Katona theorem and properties of Krawtchouck polynomials.