A generalization of steinhagen’s theorem

The theorem of Steinhagen establishes a relation between inradius and width of a convex set. The half of the width can be interpreted as the minimum of inradii of all 1-dimensional orthogonal projections of a convex set. By considering i-dimensional projections we obtain series ofi-dimensional inradii. In this paper we study some relations between these inradii and by this we find a natural generalization of Steinhagen’s theorem. Further we show in the course of our investigation that the minimal error of the triangle inequality for a set of vectors cannot be too large.     

Low dimensional sections versus projections of convex bodies

The structure of low dimensional sections and projections of symmetric convex bodies is studied. For a symmetric convex bodyB ⊂ ℝ ⁿ , inequalities between the smallest diameter of rank ℓ projections ofB and the largest in-radius ofm-dimensional sections ofB are established, for a wide range of sub-proportional dimensions. As an application it is shown that every bodyB in (isomorphic) ℓ-position admits a well-bounded (√n, 1)-mixing operator. Research of this author was partially supported by KBN Grant no. 1 P03A 015 27. This author holds the Canada Research Chair in Geometric Analysis.     

Constant Minkowskian width in terms of double normals

We extend the notion of a double normal of a convex body from smooth, strictly convex Minkowski planes to arbitrary two-dimensional real, normed, linear spaces in two different ways. Then, for both of these ways, we obtain the following characterization theorem: a convex body K in a Minkowski plane is of constant Minkowskian width iff every chord I of K splits K into two compact convex sets K₁ and K₂ such that I is a Minkowskian double normal of K₁ or K₂. Furthermore, the Euclidean version of this theorem yields a new characterization of d-dimensional Euclidean ball where d 3.     

Illuminating Spindle Convex Bodies and Minimizing the Volume of Spherical Sets of Constant Width

A subset of the d-dimensional Euclidean space having nonempty interior is called a spindle convex body if it is the intersection of (finitely or infinitely many) congruent d-dimensional closed balls. The spindle convex body is called a “fat” one, if it contains the centers of its generating balls. The core part of this paper is an extension of Schramm’s theorem and its proof on illuminating convex bodies of constant width to the family of “fat” spindle convex bodies. Also, this leads to the spherical analog of the well-known Blaschke–Lebesgue problem.     

Extreme properties of quermassintegrals of convex bodies

In this paper, we establish two theorems for the quermassintegrals of convex bodies, which are the generalizations of the well-known Aleksandrov’ s projection theorem and Loomis-Whitney’ s inequality, respectively. Applying these two theorems, we obtain a number of inequalities for the volumes of projections of convex bodies. Besides, we introduce the concept of the perturbation element of a convex body, and prove an extreme property of it.     

Section and projection means of convex bodies

This paper is concerned with various geometric averages of sections or projections of convex bodies. In particular, we consider Minkowski and Blaschke sums of sections as well as Minkowski sums of projections. The main result is a Crofton-type formula for Blaschke sums of sections. This is used to establish connections between the different averages mentioned above. As a consequence, we obtain results which show that, in some circumstances, a convex body is determined by the averages of its sections or projections.The research of the first author was supported in part by NSF grants DMS-9504249 and INT-9123373     

On convex bodies that permit packings of high density

It is well known that ann-dimensional convex body permits a lattice packing of density 1 only if it is a centrally symmetric polytope of at most 2(2 ⁿ –1) facets. This article concerns itself with the associated stability problem whether a convex body that permits a packing of high density is in some sense close to such a polytope. Several inequalities that address this stability problem are proved. A corresponding theorem for coverings by two-dimensional convex bodies is also proved.Supported by National Science Foundation Research Grants DMS 8300825 and DMS 8701893.     

An elementary proof of the Loomis–Whitney theorem

Loomis and Whitney proved an inequality between volume and areas of projections of an open set in n-dimensional space related to the isoperimetric inequality. They reduced the problem to a combinatorial theorem proved by a repeated use of Hölder inequality. In this paper we prove a general inequality between real numbers which easily implies the combinatorial theorem of Loomis and Whitney.

     

Covering Convex Bodies by Cylinders and Lattice Points by Flats

In connection with an unsolved problem of Bang (1951) we give a lower bound for the sum of the base volumes of cylinders covering a d-dimensional convex body in terms of the relevant basic measures of the given convex body. As an application we establish lower bounds on the number of k-dimensional flats (i.e. translates of k-dimensional linear subspaces) needed to cover all the integer points of a given convex body in d-dimensional Euclidean space for 1≤k≤d−1. K. Bezdek and A.E. Litvak are partially supported by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Discovery Grant.     

Comparison of volumes by means of the areas of central sections

The Busemann–Petty problem asks whether origin-symmetric convex bodies in Rⁿ with smaller areas of all central hyperplane sections necessarily have smaller n-dimensional volume. The solution was completed in the end of the 1990s, and the answer is affirmative if n4 and negative if n5. Since the answer is negative in most dimensions, it is natural to ask what information about the volumes of central sections of two bodies does allow to compare the n-dimensional volumes of these bodies in all dimensions. In this article we give an answer to this question in terms of certain powers of the Laplace operator applied to the section function of the body.     

Minimal total absolute curvature for immersions

Immersions or maps of closed manifolds in Euclidean space, of minimal absolute total curvature are called tight in this paper. (They were called convex in [25].) After the definition in Chapter 1, many examples in Chapter 2, and some special topics in Chapter 3, we prove in Chapter 4 that topological tight immersions ofn-spheres are only of the expected type, namely embeddings onto the boundary of a convexn+1-dimensional body. This generalises a theorem of Chern and Lashof in the smooth case. In Chapter 5 we show that many manifolds exist that have no tight smooth immersion in any Euclidean space.This research was partially supported by National Science Foundation grant GP-7952X1.     

Stability properties of Cauchy's surface area formula

Cauchy's surface area formula expresses the surface area of ad-dimensional convex body in terms of the mean value of the volume of its orthogonal projections onto (d–1)-dimensional linear subspaces. We consider here averages of the same kind as those in Cauchy's formula but with respect to some direction dependent density function and investigate the stability problem whether the density must be close to 1 if the formula produces approximately the correct surface area. It will be shown that this relationship between surface area and density is, in general, unstable; but if the density function satisfies suitable regularity conditions, then explicit stability estimates can be obtained.Dedicated to Professor Leopold Vietoris on the occasion of his one hundredth birthdaySupported by National Science Foundation Research Grant DMS 8922399.     

Asymptotic formulas for the diameter of sections of symmetric convex bodies

Sharpening work of the first two authors, for every proportion λ∈(0,1) we provide exact quantitative relations between global parameters of n-dimensional symmetric convex bodies and the diameter of their random ⌊λn⌋-dimensional sections. Using recent results of Gromov and Vershynin, we obtain an “asymptotic formula” for the diameter of random proportional sections.     

Projections of convex bodies and the fourier transform

The Fourier analytic approach to sections of convex bodies has recently been developed and has led to several results, including a complete analytic solution to the Busemann-Petty problem, characterizations of intersection bodies, extremal sections ofl _p-balls. In this article, we extend this approach to projections of convex bodies and show that the projection counterparts of the results mentioned above can be proved using similar methods. In particular, we present a Fourier analytic proof of the recent result of Barthe and Naor on extremal projections ofl _p-balls, and give a Fourier analytic solution to Shephard’s problem, originally solved by Petty and Schneider and asking whether symmetric convex bodies with smaller hyperplane projections necessarily have smaller volume. The proofs are based on a formula expressing the volume of hyperplane projections in terms of the Fourier transform of the curvature function.     

The geometry of p-convex intersection bodies

Busemann's theorem states that the intersection body of an origin-symmetric convex body is also convex. In this paper we provide a version of Busemann's theorem for p-convex bodies. We show that the intersection body of a p-convex body is q-convex for certain q. Furthermore, we discuss the sharpness of the previous result by constructing an appropriate example. This example is also used to show that IK, the intersection body of K, can be much farther away from the Euclidean ball than K. Finally, we extend these theorems to some general measure spaces with log-concave and s-concave measures.     

Stability in Aleksandrov's problem for a convex body,one of whose projections is a ball

A stability theorem is proved corresponding to this uniqueness theorem forn5,k3, and under the hypothesis that one of the projections of the convex body on a hyperplane ofR ⁿ is a ball. In particular the stability theorem holds in the case when the body is a solid of revolution.Translated from Ukrainskií Geometricheskií Sbornik, Issue 28, 1985, pp. 50–62.     

The lower dimensional Busemann-Petty problem for bodies with the generalized axial symmetry

The lower dimensional Busemann-Petty problem asks, whether n-dimensional centrally symmetric convex bodies with smaller i-dimensional central sections necessarily have smaller volumes. For i = 1, the affirmative answer is obvious. If i > 3, the answer is negative. For i = 2 or i = 3 (n > 4), the problem is still open, however, when the body with smaller sections is a body of revolution, the answer is affirmative. The paper contains a solution to the problem in the more general situation, when the body with smaller sections is invariant under rotations, preserving mutually orthogonal subspaces of dimensions ℓ and n − ℓ, respectively, so that i + ℓ ≤ n. The answer essentially depends on ℓ. The argument relies on the notion of canonical angles between subspaces, spherical Radon transforms, properties of intersection bodies, and the generalized cosine transforms.     

Distances between measures from 1-dimensional projections as implied by continuity of the inverse radon transform

Summary Distances between measures on IR ^d are determined from distances between their 1-dimensional projections. The method employed involves considering the 1-dimensional projections to be the Radon transform of the measures. Crucial to the main theorem is a continuity result for the inverse Radon transform. Focus is restricted to the Prohorov, dual bounded Lipschitz and d _k metrics which metrize weak convergence of probability measures. These metrics are related to each other and to the Sobolev norms. The d _k results extend from measures to generalized functions.Partially supported by NSF Grant No. MCS-81-01895Partially supported by NSF Grant No. MCS-82-01627 and support from the Mellon Foundation     

Some characterisations of the ellipsoid

We show that a convex bodyK of dimensiond≧3 is an ellipsoid if it has any of the following properties: (1) the “grazes” of all points close toK are flat, (2) all sections of small diameter are centrally symmetric, (3) parallel (d−1)-sections close to the boundary are width-equivalent, (4)K is strictly convex and all (d−1)-sections close to the boundary are centrally symmetric; the last two results are deduced from their 3-dimensional cases which were proved by Aitchison.     

On the generalized Busemann-Petty problem

The generalized Busemann-Petty problem asks whether the origin-symmetric convex bodies in ℝ ⁿ with a larger volume of all i-dimensional sections necessarily have a larger volume. As proved by Bourgain and Zhang, the answer to this question is negative if i > 3. The problem is still open for i = 2, 3. In this article we prove two specific affirmative answers to the generalized Busemann-Petty problem if the body with a smaller i-dimensional volume belongs to given classes. Our results generalize Zhang’s specific affirmative answer to the generalized Busemann-Petty problem. This work was supported, in part, by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 10671117)