Sisters of some 4-dimensional elation Laguerre planes of group dimension 10 (Q2270146)

The deep results of \textit{A.~Schroth} [Topological circle planes and topological quadrangles. Harlow Essex: Longman (1995; Zbl 0839.51013)] on the relationship between locally compact connected Laguerre planes and compact connected generalized quadrangles provide us with the following method of constructing new Laguerre planes from known ones: Starting from a Laguerre plane \(\mathcal L\), one forms its Lie geometry \(\overline {\mathcal L}\), which is a generalized quadrangle. Its points are the points and the lines of \(\mathcal L\), plus one additional point \(\infty\). Deriving \(\overline {\mathcal L}\) at any point other than \(\infty\), one obtains again a Laguerre plane which is, in general, not isomorphic to \(\mathcal L\). It is called a sister of \(\mathcal L\). In the paper under review, this method is applied systematically to the known 4-dimensional Laguerre planes. Except for the classical plane, all known planes are elation Laguerre planes and have a 10-dimensional automorphism group. There is an infinite family of so-called semi-classical planes (glued from two classical halves) and two single planes, one with a solvable group and one with a non-solvable one. All of them were found by the author. It has been proved by the author [Adv. Geom. 6, No. 3, 339--360 (2006; Zbl 1121.51008)] that these are in fact all 4-dimensional Laguerre planes with a 10-dimensional group, up to isomorphism. The sister is easily described only if a point of the original plane is used to derive the Lie geometry. It is shown that doing this with a 4-dimensional elation Laguerre plane always produces a plane which is not an elation Laguerre plane, and whose derived affine planes are shift planes except for one translation plane. Starting from the single Laguerre plane with a solvable group, one obtains a sister with an 8-dimensional group. Its derived affine planes are (1) Betten's translation plane \(\mathcal B\) with a solvable 8-dimensional group and (2) shift planes obtained from \(\mathcal B\) by the process called integration; in particular, Knarr's unique shift plane with a 7-dimenisonal group occurs here. The sisters of semiclassical Laguerre planes have groups of dimension 7, and their derived affine planes are (1) Betten's translation plane with a reducible \(\text{SL}_2\mathbb R\)-action, and (2) complex skew-parabola planes. All affine planes occuring here are described in [\textit{H.~Salzmann} et al., Compact projective planes. With an introduction to octonion geometry. Berlin: de Gruyter (1996; Zbl 0851.51003)].