On the combinatorics of projective mappings (Q1610686): Difference between revisions

Let \(\mathcal{P}\) denote the group of non-degenerate projective mappings of \(\mathbb R \cup \{\infty\}\), i.e. the set of non-constant linear fractions \(x\mapsto\frac{ax+b}{cx+d}\) where \(ad-bc\neq 0\), with the composition \(\varphi \circ \psi: x\mapsto \varphi(\psi(x))\) as the group operation. Finite sets of such mappings are denoted by \(\Phi\) or \(\Psi\). For \(\Phi, \Psi \subset \mathcal{P}\), put \(\Phi \circ \Psi = \{\varphi \circ \psi: \varphi \in\Phi, \psi\in\Psi\}\) and call it a composition set. The main result of the paper is as follows: Let \(C> 0\). If \(| \Phi| \), \(| \Psi| \geq n\) and \(| \Phi\circ \Psi| \leq Cn\), then there exists an abelian subgroup \(\mathcal{S} \subset \mathcal{P}\) such that \(\Phi\) and \(\Psi\) are contained in a bounded number of left and right cosets of \(\mathcal{S}\), respectively.