MRD codes with maximum idealizers (Q776314)

Rank-metric codes are a class of codes consisting of matrices with entries in a finite field, with the distance between two matrices being the rank of their difference. Codes with maximum size for a fixed minimum distance are called Maximum Rank Distance (MRD) codes, which are an analog of MDS codes for the Hamming metric. Rank-metric codes have important applications in random linear network coding, and MRD codes also have connections to other topics such as semifields, finite geometry, linearized polynomials, and cryptography. In this context, it is important to say that only a few classes of MRD codes are known, and among them, Gabidulin codes were the only known class of MRD codes with maximum left and right idealizers. In this paper, the authors classify MRD codes in \(\mathbb{F}_q^{n\times n}\) for \(n\le 9\) with maximum left and right idealizers, and find out new MRD codes with maximum idealizers for \(n=7\), \(q\) odd and for \(n=8\), \(q\equiv 1 \pmod{3}\). Some interesting open problems are also provided.