The number of regular semisimple conjugacy classes in the finite classical groups. (Q2637163)

A square matrix over \(F_q\) is said to be semisimple if its minimal polynomial has no repeated roots in the algebraic closure of \(F_q\). An element of a finite classical group \(G\) is said to be regular if its centralizer in the corresponding group over the algebraic closure of \(F_q\) has dimension as small as possible. For the general linear, unitary, and symplectic groups, a matrix is regular if and only if its characteristic polynomial is equal to its minimal polynomial; this is not true for orthogonal groups. In this paper the authors study the enumeration of regular semisimple conjugacy classes in finite classical groups. For the general linear, unitary, and symplectic groups this gives a different approach to known results; for the special orthogonal groups the results are new.