Related papers: Excluding a line from $\mathbb C$-representable ma…

For all positive integers $s$ and $t$ exceeding one, a matroid $M$ on $n$ elements is {\em nearly $(s, t)$-cyclic} if there is a cyclic ordering $\sigma$ of its ground set such that every $s-1$ consecutive elements of $\sigma$ are contained…

The Sylvester-Gallai Theorem states that every rank-$3$ real-representable matroid has a two-point line. We prove that, for each $k\ge 2$, every complex-representable matroid with rank at least $4^{k-1}$ has a rank-$k$ flat with exactly $k$…

For each odd integer $k\ge 5$, we prove that, if $M$ is a simple rank-$r$ binary matroid with no odd circuit of length less than $k$ and with $|M| > k 2^{r-k+1}$, then $M$ is isomorphic to a restriction of the rank-$r$ binary affine…

Let the sign components of the maximal covectors of a simple oriented matroid M be represented by the real numbers -1 and 1. Consider the vertex set V(R) of a symmetric cycle R of adjacent topes in the tope graph of M as a subposet of the…

An $L$-matrix is a matrix whose off-diagonal entries belong to a set $L$, and whose diagonal is zero. Let $N(r,L)$ be the maximum size of a square $L$-matrix of rank at most $r$. Many applications of linear algebra in extremal combinatorics…

For a graph $G$, let $f_2(G)$ denote the largest number of vertices in a $2$-regular subgraph of $G$. We determine the minimum of $f_2(G)$ over $3$-regular $n$-vertex simple graphs $G$. To do this, we prove that every $3$-regular multigraph…

Let G be a group acting faithfully on a set X. The distinguishing number of the action of G on X is the smallest number of colors such that there exists a coloring of X where no nontrivial group element induces a color-preserving…

Given a finite word $w$ over a finite alphabet $V$, consider the graph with vertex set $V$ and with an edge between two elements of $V$ if and only if the two elements alternate in the word $w$. Such a graph is said to be word-representable…

For positive integers $n$ and $r$, we consider $n$-vertex graphs with the maximum number of $r$-edge-colorings with no copy of a triangle where exactly two colors appear. We prove that, if $2 \leq r \leq 26$ and $n$ is sufficiently large,…

There exist several theorems which state that when a matroid is representable over distinct fields F_1,...,F_k, it is also representable over other fields. We prove a theorem, the Lift Theorem, that implies many of these results. First,…

For a matroid $M$ having $m$ rank-one flats, the density $d(M)$ is $\tfrac{m}{r(M)}$ unless $m = 0$, in which case $d(M)= 0$. A matroid is density-critical if all of its proper minors of non-zero rank have lower density. By a 1965 theorem…

We prove that for any integer $n\geq 12$, and for every $r$ in the interval $[3, \ldots, \lfloor (n-1)/2\rfloor]$, the group $A_n$ has a string C-group representation of rank $r$ therefore showing that the only alternating group whose set…

Let $\cM$ be a minor-closed class of matroids that does not contain arbitrarily long lines. The growth rate function, $h:\bN\rightarrow \bN$ of $\cM$ is given by $$h(n) = \max(|M|\, : \, M\in \cM, simple, rank-$n$).$$ The Growth Rate…

A simple binary matroid, viewed as a restriction of a finite binary projective geometry $PG(n-1,2)$, is $I_{1,t}$-free if for any rank-$t$ flat of $PG(n-1,2)$, its intersection with the matroid is not a one-element set. In this paper, we…

We prove that in a simple matroid, the maximal number of joints that can be formed by L lines is o(L^2) and Omega(L^{2 - epsilon}) for any epsilon > 0.

The forbidden number $\mathrm{forb}(m,F)$, which denotes the maximum number of unique columns in an $m$-rowed $(0,1)$-matrix with no submatrix that is a row and column permutation of $F$, has been widely studied in extremal set theory.…

Let $S$ be a finite subset of ${\mathbb R}^2 \setminus (0,0)$. Generally, one would expect the pattern of lines $Ax + By = 1$, where $(A, B) \in S$ to contain polygons of all shapes and sizes. We show, however, that when $S$ is a…

Consider a matroid $M=(E,\mathcal{I})$ with its elements of the ground set $E$ colored. A rainbow basis is a maximum independent set in which each element receives a different color. The rank of a subset $S$ of $E$, denoted by $r_M(S)$, is…

We consider the rank reduction problem for matroids: Given a matroid M and an integer k, find a minimum size subset of elements of M whose removal reduces the rank of M by at least k. When M is a graphical matroid this problem is the…

The column number question asks for the maximal number of columns of an integer matrix with the property that all its rank size minors are bounded by a fixed parameter $\Delta$ in absolute value. Polynomial upper bounds have been proved in…