Progress on Dirac's conjecture (Q405200)

Summary: In 1951, Gabriel Dirac conjectured that every non-collinear set \(P\) of \(n\) points in the plane contains a point incident to at least \(\frac{n}{2}-c\) of the lines determined by \(P\), for some constant \(c\) [\textit{G. A. Dirac}, Q. J. Math., Oxf. II. Ser. 2, 221--227 (1951; Zbl 0043.14602)]. The following weakened conjecture was proved by Beck and by Szemerédi and Trotter: every non-collinear set \(P\) of \(n\) points in the plane contains a point in at least \(\frac{n}{c'}\) lines determined by \(P\), for some constant \(c'\). We prove this result with \(c'= 37\). We also give the best known constant for Beck's theorem, proving that every set of \(n\) points with at most \(\ell\) collinear determines at least \(\frac{1}{98} n(n-\ell)\) lines.