Constructions and properties of optimally spread subspace packings via symmetric and affine block designs and mutually unbiased bases

Abstract

We continue the study of optimal chordal packings, with emphasis on packing subspaces of dimension greater than one. Following a principle outlined in a previous work, where the authors use maximal affine block designs and maximal sets of mutually unbiased bases to construct Grassmannian $2$-designs, we show that their method extends to other types of block designs, leading to a plethora of optimal subspace packings characterized by the orthoplex bound. More generally, we show that any optimal chordal packing is necessarily a fusion frame and that its spatial complement is also optimal.