On the size of a double blocking set in \(\text{PG}(2,q)\) (Q1383492)

A double blocking set in a projective plane is a set of points with the property that every line of the plane contains at least two of these points. Using the lacunary polynomial technique, the authors obtain the following result: Theorem: Let \(S\) be a double blocking set in \(\text{PG}(2,q)\). If \(q\) is a square greater than 16 then \(| S | \geq 2q + 2 \sqrt{q} + 2\). If \(3 < q = p^{2d+1}\) then \(| S | \geq 2q + p^d \lceil (p^{d+1} + 1)/(p^d + 1) \rceil + 2\). In the case of a square \(q\), the bound can be obtained by a union of two disjoint Baer subplanes. While the bound in the non-square case is better (especially when \(q\) is a prime), the authors suspect that the bound may not be tight. Some planes of small order are examined, and ad hoc arguments are given that slightly improve on the bound given in the theorem. The authors also use this technique to examine ordinary blocking sets in square order desarguesian planes which are not lines or Baer subplanes. They obtain the same bound (with the same restriction) as in the double blocking set case. This result, while an improvement on the previously known best bound, is probably not the best possible.