A simplicial 3-arrangement of 21 planes (Q1082607)

Generalizing the notion of ''arrangement of lines in the plane'' one defines a projective d-arrangement A as a finite set of hyperplanes in d- dimensional real projective space \({\mathbb{P}}^ d\) having empty intersection; such an arrangement is called simplicial if all the open connected components of \({\mathbb{P}}^ d\setminus (\cup A)\) are simplicies. Higher dimensional simplicial arrangements can be built up from two lower dimensional ones by a suitable ''join'' construction: a simplicial arrangement that cannot be obtained in this way is called sporadic. Extending Grünbaum's ''facet hyperplane method'' the authors consider a regular tetrahedron in 3-dimensional Euclidean space and produce a 3- arrangement consisting of 21 planes in \({\mathbb{P}}^ 3\); by giving all the relevant informations about the incidence properties of this arrangement, they are able to prove that it is simplicial and sporadic and furthermore that it is not isomorphic to any one of the 15 sporadic simplicial 3- arrangements that were known so far. In an analogous way, for \(d\geq 4\) one can define a d-arrangement starting from a regular d-dimensional simplex: the authors conclude mentioning the conjecture that for \(d=4\) (and eventually for each d) such arrangement be simplicial.