A characterization of the ternary matroids with no \(M(K_ 4)\)-minor (Q1071023)

This paper studies the classes of ternary and GF(4)-representable matroids with no minor isomorphic to \(M(K_ 4)\), the cycle matroid of the complete graph on 4 vertices. The class of binary matroids with no \(M(K_ 4)\)-minor was identified by \textit{T. Brylawski} [Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 154, 1-22 (1971; Zbl 0215.337)] as being the class of series- parallel networks. The main result of this paper is that, with one exception, the only non-trivial 3-connected ternary matroids with no \(M(K_ 4)\)-minor are whirls or minors of the Steiner system S(5,6,12). This characterization is used to give excluded-minor descriptions for the class of ternary gammoids and two other related classes. The first of these results answers a question of \textit{A. W. Ingleton} [Higher Comb., Proc. NATO Adv. Study Inst., Berlin (West) 1976, 117-131 (1977; Zbl 0379.05017)] and verifies a conjecture of \textit{T. Brylawski} [Studies Appl. Math. 54, 143-160 (1975; Zbl 0309.05018)]. The main result is also used to verify the ternary case of another conjecture of T. Brylawski [op. cit.] by showing that a loopless ternary matroid with no \(M(K_ 4)\)-minor has critical exponent at most two.