Affine planes admitting a collineation group with a transitive action on the line at infinity (Q975088)

This paper is concerned with affine planes \(\mathcal{A}\) which admit a special collineation group \(G\). The following are the main results of the paper. Theorem 1. Let \(G\) be an almost simple collineation group of an affine plane \(\mathcal{A}\) of order \(n\). If the action of \(G\) on the line at infinity is transitive, then \(G\) is 2-transitive on the line at infinity and one of the following cases occurs: (1) \(n=2^s\), \(\mathcal{A} \cong AG_2(2^s)\) and \(PSL_2(2^s) \leq G\); (2) \(n=2^{2s}\) and \(Sz(2^s) \leq G\); (3) \(n=2^{3s}\) and \(PSU_3(2^s) \leq G\). Theorem 2. If \(G\) is faithful and primitive on the line at infinity of an affine plane \(\mathcal{A}\) of order \(n\), then the involutions in \(G\) are perspectivities of \(\mathcal{A}\) and one of the following occurs: (1) \(n=2^s\), \(\mathcal{A} \cong AG_2(2^s)\) and \(K \leq G \leq Aut(K)\) where \(K \cong PSL_2(2^s)\); (2) \(n=2^{2s}\) and \(K \leq G \leq Aut(K)\) where \(K \cong Sz(2^s)\); (3) \(n=2^{3s}\) and \(K \leq G \leq Aut(K)\) where \(K \cong PSU_3(2^s)\); (4) \(Soc(G)\) is an elementary abelian \(p\)-group of order \(n+1\). Theorem 2 follows from Theorem 1 and the O-Nan Scott Theorem. The cases (2) occur in the Lüneburg plane of order \(2^{2s}\), while the cases (3) are still open.