Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2004/iii/paper-2/3/a/solution

Since the two-transitive group action is primitive, the orbits of any nontrivial normal subgroup form only the single block . Thus is transitive. If is regular, identify with by . Then , , and conjugation by gives automorphisms of . The two-transitive group action makes these automorphisms transitive on . All nonidentity elements therefore have the same order, which must be a prime : a suitable power of an element of composite order would have a smaller nontrivial order. Cauchy's theorem for finite groups now shows .
The center of a group of prime-power order is nontrivial and is a characteristic subgroup. The transitive conjugation action on nonidentity elements therefore forces . Hence is an elementary abelian group, which we identify with the additive vector space . Conjugation by is linear on this vector space. It is faithful: an element fixing and centralizing fixes every , hence is the identity permutation. Consequently
Here the general affine group acts by translations followed by invertible linear maps.

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