The geometric description of a cyclic \((q- \sqrt{q}+1)\)-arc in \(\text{PG} (q-\sqrt{q}-3,q)\), \(q\) square (Q5935448)

An \(n\)-arc in \(PG(N,q)\), \(n \geq N + 1\), is a set of \(n\) points, every \(N+1\) of which are linearly independent. It is well known that \(n\)-arcs in \(PG(N,q)\) are equivalent to [\(n,N+1,n-N\)] MDS codes (Maximum Distance Separable). The dual code \(C^{\perp}\) of an [\(n,N+1,n-N\)] MDS code \(C\) is an [\(n, n-N-1, N+2\)] MDS code. \(C^{\perp}\) corresponds to an \(n\)-arc in \(PG(n-N-2,q)\). Two \(n\)-arcs which are related in this way are called \(C\)-dual arcs. An interesting class of arcs are the complete (can not be extended to a larger arc) \(q - \sqrt{q} + 1\) arcs in \(PG(2,q)\), \( q\) a square. These arcs can be characterized either as the intersection of two Hermitian curves or as orbits of a cyclic subgroup of the Singer group acting on the plane. The \(C\)-dual arcs of these are \(q - \sqrt{q} + 1\) arcs in \(PG(q - \sqrt{q} -3, q)\). In this paper the authors investigate these \(C\)-dual arcs. It is shown that these \(C\)-dual arcs are contained in the intersection of Hermitian varieties which are stabilized by a cyclic group of order \(q - \sqrt{q}+1\). This shows that the cyclic group is a subgroup of a maximal subgroup of the unitary group \(PGU(q-\sqrt{q}-2,q)\). This cyclic group is described in detail, and this description depends on the value of \(\sqrt{q} \bmod 3\). Small values of \(q\) (i.e., 9, 16 and 25) are examined in light of these results with implications for the value of the cardinality of the second largest complete arcs in projective spaces of various dimensions.