Homotopy properties of the complex of frames of a unitary space

Abstract: Let

V

be a finite dimensional vector space equipped with a non-degenerate Hermitian form over a field

m a t h b b K

. Let

m a t h c a l G (V)

be the graph with vertex set the

1

-dimensional non-degenerate subspaces of

V

and adjacency relation given by orthogonality. We give a complete description of when

m a t h c a l G (V)

is connected in terms of the dimension of

V

and the size of the ground field

m a t h b b K

. Furthermore, we prove that if

d i m (V) > 4

then the clique complex

m a t h c a l F (V)

of

m a t h c a l G (V)

is simply connected. For finite fields

m a t h b b K

, we also compute the eigenvalues of the adjacency matrix of

m a t h c a l G (V)

. Then by Garland's method, we conclude that

i l d e H_{m} (m a t h c a l F (V); m a t h b b k) = 0

for all

0 l e q m l e q d i m (V) - 3

, where

m a t h b b k

is a field of characteristic

0

, provided that

d i m (V)^{2} l e q | m a t h b b K |

. Under these assumptions, we deduce that the barycentric subdivision of

m a t h c a l F (V)

deformation retracts to the order complex of the certain rank selection of

m a t h c a l F (V)

which is Cohen-Macaulay over

m a t h b b k

. Finally, we apply our results to the Quillen poset of elementary abelian

p

-subgroups of a finite group and to the study of geometric properties of the poset of non-degenerate subspaces of

V

and the poset of orthogonal decompositions of

V

.

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