Finite two-distance tight frames

Abstract

A finite collection of unit vectors $S \subset \mathbb{R}^n$ is called a spherical two-distance set if there are two numbers $a$ and $b$ such that the inner products of distinct vectors from $S$ are either $a$ or $b$. We prove that if $a\ne -b,$ then a two-distance set that forms a tight frame for $\mathbb{R}^n$ is a spherical embedding of a strongly regular graph, and every strongly regular graph gives rise to two-distance tight frames through standard spherical embeddings. Together with an earlier work by S. Waldron on the equiangular case ({\em Linear Alg. Appl.}, vol. 41, pp. 2228-2242, 2009) this completely characterizes two-distance tight frames. As an intermediate result, we obtain a classification of all two-distance 2-designs.\