Related papers: Nov\'{a}k's conjecture on cyclic Steiner triple sy…

The paper studies the global convergence of the block Jacobi me\-thod for symmetric matrices. Given a symmetric matrix $A$ of order $n$, the method generates a sequence of matrices by the rule $A^{(k+1)}=U_k^TA^{(k)}U_k$, $k\geq0$, where…

Let $D(n)$ be the number of pairwise disjoint Steiner quadruple systems. A simple counting argument shows that $D(n) \leq n-3$ and a set of $n-3$ such systems is called a large set. No nontrivial large set was constructed yet, although it…

Whereas Steiner systems $S(2,k,v)$ with block length $k \le 5$ have large amount of examples and the existence is established for all admissible $v$, for $k\ge 6$ only few examples are known even for decided cases. In this paper the…

An incidence structure consists simply of a set P of points and a set B of blocks, with a relation of incidence between points and blocks.A symmetric (v,k,\lambda) block design is the subject of this paper. The symmetric (n^2+n+1, n+1,1)…

In this paper we consider the following conjecture, proposed by Brian Alspach, concerning partial sums in finite cyclic groups: given a subset $A$ of $\mathbb{Z}_n\setminus \{0\}$ of size $k$ such that $\sum_{z\in A} z\not= 0$, it is…

A subset of $[n] = \{1,2,\ldots,n\}$ is called stable if it forms an independent set in the cycle on the vertex set $[n]$. In 1978, Schrijver proved via a topological argument that for all integers $n$ and $k$ with $n \geq 2k$, the family…

In 1847, Kirkman proved that there exists a Steiner triple system on $n$ vertices (equivalently a triangle decomposition of the edges of $K_n$) whenever $n$ satisfies the necessary divisibility conditions (namely $n\equiv 1,3 \mod 6$). In…

A Steiner 2-design of block size k is an ordered pair (V, B) of finite sets such that B is a family of k-subsets of V in which each pair of elements of V appears exactly once. A Steiner 2-design is said to be r-even-free if for every…

In 1963, Anton Kotzig famously conjectured that $K_{n}$, the complete graph of order $n$, where $n$ is even, can be decomposed into $n-1$ perfect matchings such that every pair of these matchings forms a Hamilton cycle. The problem is still…

Two new sufficient conditions for generalized cycles (including Hamilton and dominating cycles as special cases) in an arbitrary k-connected graph (k=1,2,...) are derived, which prove the truth of Bondy's (1980) famous conjecture for some…

In 1940 Fisher famously showed that if there exists a non-trivial $(v,k,\lambda)$-design then $\lambda(v-1) \geq k(k-1)$. Subsequently Bose gave an elegant alternative proof of Fisher's result. Here, we show that the idea behind Bose's…

We construct several cyclic $(v;k_1,k_2,k_3;\lambda)$ difference families with $v\equiv3 \pmod{4}$ a prime and $\lambda=k_1+k_2+k_3-(3v-1)/4$. Such families can be used in conjunction with the well-known Paley-Todd difference sets to…

In 1999, Jacobson and Lehel conjectured that for $k \geq 3$, every $k$-regular Hamiltonian graph has cycles of at least linearly many different lengths. This was further strengthened by Verstra\"{e}te, who asked whether the regularity can…

In 1984, Winkler conjectured that every simple Venn diagram with $n$ curves can be extended to a simple Venn diagram with $n+1$ curves. His conjecture is equivalent to the statement that the dual graph of any simple Venn diagram has a…

A number of applications of Steiner triple systems (e.g. disk erasure codes) exist that require a special ordering of its blocks. Universal cycles, introduced by Chung, Diaconis, and Graham in 1992, and Gray codes are examples of listing…

A Ryser design $\mathcal{D}$ on $v$ points is a collection of $v$ proper subsets (called blocks) of a point-set with $v$ points such that every two blocks intersect each other in $\lambda$ points (and $\lambda < v$ is a fixed number) and…

A conjecture by Rafla from 1988 asserts that every simple drawing of the complete graph $K_n$ admits a plane Hamiltonian cycle. It turned out that already the existence of much simpler non-crossing substructures in such drawings is hard to…

Nivat's conjecture is a long-standing open combinatorial problem. It concerns two-dimensional configurations, that is, maps $\mathbb Z^2 \rightarrow \mathcal A$ where $\mathcal A$ is a finite set of symbols. Such configurations are often…

We show that for any n divisible by 3, almost all order-n Steiner triple systems admit a decomposition of almost all their triples into disjoint perfect matchings (that is, almost all Steiner triple systems are almost resolvable).

Large sets of combinatorial designs has always been a fascinating topic in design theory. These designs form a partition of the whole space into combinatorial designs with the same parameters. In particular, a large set of block designs,…