Point-line incidence on Grassmannians and majority logic decoding of Grassmann codes (Q2031641)

This paper introduces a majority decoding algorithm for Grassmannian codes. Given a finite field \(\mathbb{F}_q\), the Grassmannian \(G_{\ell m}(\mathbb{F}_q)\) is the algebraic variety whose points are the \(\ell\)-dimensional linear spaces of \(\mathbb{F}_q^m\). The cardinality of the Grassmannian is the Gaussian binomial coefficient \(\begin{bmatrix} c & m \\ \ell\end{bmatrix}_{q}=:n\). For any \(V\in G_{\ell m}(\mathbb{F}_q)\), given a basis \(\left(\mathbf{v}_j\right)_{j=0}^{\ell-1}\) of \(V\), the \(\ell\)-multivector \(\mathbf{v}_0\cdots\mathbf{v}_{\ell-1}\) can be calculated and it depends just on \(V\) and not on the chosen basis. Hence, the Grassmannian is identified with \(\mathbb{F}_q^k\) where \(k=\binom{m}{\ell}\) and when composing it with the canonical projection \(\mathbb{F}_q^k\to\mathbb{P}^{k-1}\), where \(\mathbb{P}^{k-1}\) is the corresponding projective space, the Plückner map is obtained. The Grassmannian code is the \(k\)-dimensional linear space in \(\mathbb{F}_q^n\) whose codewords are evaluations on the elements of \(G_{\ell m}(\mathbb{F}_q)\) of linear combinations of the forms obtained as minors of a \(\ell\times m\)-matrix of variables. The minimum distance of the Grassmannian code is \(d = q^{\ell(m-\ell)}\) and the minimum distance of its dual is 3. The geometry of the Grassmannian \(G_{\ell m}(\mathbb{F}_q)\) is analyzed and a graph structure is provided. The geodesics are shortest paths connecting pairs of points and some characteristic number sequences are introduced with respect to a given flag in \(\mathbb{F}_q\). Thus, a majority logic decoder is proposed for Grassmannian codes. Initially, it is introduced by an illustrative example, thereafter it is given in its whole generality. The decoder is quite effective and it gives practical applications of Grassmannian codes.