Packing pairs by quintuples: The case of zero congruence mod 4 (Q1804219)

Let \(X\) be a \(v\)-set of points. A packing of pairs by quintuples (briefly packing) is a pair \((X, A)\), where \(A\) is a family of quintuples of \(X\) (called blocks) such that every pair of distinct points from \(X\) occurs in at most one block. If no other such packings has more blocks, the packing is said to be maximum, and the number of blocks in a maximum packing is called the packing number, denoted by \(D(v)\). The packing problem is to determine the values of \(D(v)\) for all positive integers \(v\). Let \(B(v)= \lfloor v\lfloor(v- 1)/4\rfloor/5\rfloor\), where \(\lfloor x\rfloor\) is the floor of \(x\). S. M. Johnson has shown that \(D(v)\leq B(v)\). Furthermore, the values of \(D(v)\) were determined for all \(v\equiv 1\) or \(5\pmod{20}\), where the maximum packings are exact; for all \(v\leq 24\); for \(v= 28\), where \(D(v)= B(v)\). Almost nothing is known about the packing number \(D(v)\) for other values of \(v\). In this paper the author shows that for all positive integers \(v\equiv 0\pmod 4\), \(D(v)= B(v)\) except for \(v= 12, 16\) and possibly excepting \(v= 32, 48, 52, 72, 132, 152, 172, 232, 252, 272, 332, 352, 432\). Moreover, \(D(12)= B(12)- 1\) and \(D(16)= B(16)- 3\).