Geometry of the structure of linear complements (Q1879103)

Let \(V\) be a vector space over a not necessarily commutative field and let \(k\) be a natural number such that \(0 < k < \text{ dim}(V)\). A \(k\)-pencil is the set of \(k\)-dimensional subspaces which are contained in a given \((k+1)\)-dimensional subspace and which contain a given \((k-1)\)-dimensional subspace. The authors call the geometry of the \(k\)-dimensional subspaces and the \(k\)-pencils the space of pencils of index \(k\). For a given subspace \(Y\) of \(V\) and a natural number \(m\) such that \(m \leq k\), \(m \leq \text{ dim}(Y)\) and \(\text{ dim}(Y) +k -m \leq \text{ dim}(V)\), one can define a so-called spine space with points the \(k\)-dimensional subspaces of \(V\) which intersect \(Y\) in an \(m\)-dimensional subspace and with lines the collections (of size at least two) of points which are contained in a given \(k\)-pencil. If \(m=0\) and \(\text{codim}(Y)=k\), the points of the spine space consist of the linear complements of \(Y\). The term affine spine space is used as a reference to a space of linear complements equipped with some parallelism. The authors show that an affine spine space can be extended to the affine space. Moreover, every automorphism of the affine spine space comes from an automorphism of the affine space.