No label defined (Q4028433)

[For the entire collection see Zbl 0748.00018.] In this paper, a triple in a Steiner triple system (STS) is called a line. Let \(C\) be a configuration consisting of four lines. Then it is known that there are 16 such configurations \(C_ i(i=1,\dots,16)\). The question is: Given any \(C_ i\), for which values of \(v\) (the number of vertices) is there an STS whose set of lines can be decomposed into copies of \(C_ i\)? It is easy to show that a necessary condition is \(v\equiv 1\) or 9 (mod 24). The authors show that for 10 of the configurations \(C_ i\) the values of \(v\) can be determined completely (that is, \(v\geq 9\) or \(v\geq 25\), depending on i). For the other 6 configurations the results are similar, except that the value \(v=81\) is in doubt.