The Finite Projective Plane and the 5-Uniform Linear Intersecting Hypergraphs with Domination Number Four

Abstract

The matching number \(\alpha '(H)\) of a hypergraph H is the size of a largest matching in H, where a matching is a set of pairwise disjoint edges in H. A dominating set in H is a subset D of vertices of H such that for every \(v\in V(H)\setminus D\) there exists \(u\in D\) such that u and v lie in an edge of H, and the domination number of H, denoted by \(\gamma (H)\), is the minimum cardinality of a dominating set in H. It was shown that a Ryser-like inequality \(\gamma (H)\le (r-1)\alpha '(H)\) holds for hypergraphs H of rank r. In particular, for intersecting hypergraphs H of rank r, \(\gamma (H)\le r-1\), since \(\alpha '(H)=1\). The linear intersecting hypergraphs of rank \(2\le r\le 4\) achieving the equality \(\gamma (H)=r-1\) have been characterized. In this paper we show that all the 5-uniform linear intersecting hypergraphs H with equality \(\gamma (H)=r-1\) are generated by the finite projective plane of order three.