The Geometry of Pattern Groups

Abstract

Coset incidence geometries are an important tool which connect group theory and geometry. While the representations of the unitriangular group and its pattern subgroups have been studied extensively, the underlying geometric structures of these groups has remained largely unexplored. In this article, we construct the natural coset geometry associated with each pattern group over a finite field $\FF_q$, and prove geometrical properties of theses structures. We show how combinatorial features of their defining closed sets directly correspond to properties of their parabolic subgroups, in particular the intersection of parabolics and normality of the Borel subgroup. Finally, we characterize the automorphisms of these geometries and examine how pattern geometries behave under change of field within the same characteristic $p$.