Construction of referee squares (Q1377852): Difference between revisions

Let \(n\geq 3\) be an odd integer. A referee square of side \(n\) is an \(n\times n\) array, \(R\), whose entries are either 2-subsets or empty subsets of \(S= \{1,2, \dots,n\}\) such that each 2-subset occurs in exactly one cell of \(R\), each \(i\in S\) occurs precisely once in each row and column of \(R\) other than the \(i\)th for which it fails to appear, and the main diagonal cells are all nonempty. I. Anderson, G. Hamilton, and A. Hilton [preprint] have conjectured the existence of a referee square for every odd \(n\geq 3\) other than 5. The author uses Room squares to establish the existence of a referee square for every odd composite \(n\). A referee square of side \(n\) is \(Z\)-cyclic if the occurrence of \(\{a,b\}\) in cell \((i,j)\) implies that \(\{a+1, b+1\}\) is in cell \((i+1, j+1)\), with arithmetic done \(\bmod n\). Anderson et al. constructed \(Z\)-cyclic referee squares for \(n=3, 11\), and 13, and the author constructs them for odd \(n\) up through 49 (except for 5, 7, and 9 for which they do not exist). Indeed, the author conjectures the existence of a \(Z\)-cyclic referee square for all odd \(n\geq 11\).