Designs from pairs of finite fields. I: A cyclic unital U(6) and other regular Steiner 2-designs (Q1124592)

A Steiner t-design with parameters v and k denoted by S(t,k,v) is a pair (X,B) where X is a v-set (its elements are called points) and B is a set of k-subsets of X (its elements are called blocks) such that each t- subset of X is contained in a unique block. This design is called regular if it admits an automorphism group of order v, which acts transitively on the points. If further, this group is cyclic then the design is called cyclic. In this paper a general construction for Steiner 2-designs with prime power block size (and with a point regular automorphism group) is presented. Its success depends on number-theoretic restrictions on the parameters these are completely analysed in case of block sizes \(k\leq 11\). The new designs constructed include infinitely many cyclic Steiner 2-designs with block size 7. Among them is a cyclic unital U(6), that is an \(S(2,6+1,6^ 3+1)\). It is the first example of a unital with non- prime power parameter and the second example of a cyclic unital.