Decompositions of a polygon into centrally symmetric pieces

In this paper we deal with edge-to-edge, irreducible decompositions of a centrally symmetric convex $(2k)$-gon into centrally symmetric convex pieces. We prove an upper bound on the number of these decompositions for any value of $k$, and characterize them for octagons.Comment: 17 pages, 17 figure

Deformations of bordered Riemann surfaces and associahedral polytopes

We consider the moduli space of bordered Riemann surfaces with boundary and marked points. Such spaces appear in open-closed string theory, particularly with respect to holomorphic curves with Lagrangian submanifolds. We consider a combinatorial framework to view the compactification of this space based on the pair-of-pants decomposition of the surface, relating it to the well-known phenomenon of bubbling. Our main result classifies all such spaces that can be realized as convex polytopes. A new polytope is introduced based on truncations of cubes, and its combinatorial and algebraic structures are related to generalizations of associahedra and multiplihedra.Comment: 25 pages, 31 figure

All finitely presented groups are QSF

This is the third and last of three papers containing the complete proof that all finitely presented groups are QSF.Comment: 57 page

On k-Convex Polygons

We introduce a notion of $k$-convexity and explore polygons in the plane that have this property. Polygons which are \mbox{$k$-convex} can be triangulated with fast yet simple algorithms. However, recognizing them in general is a 3SUM-hard problem. We give a characterization of \mbox{$2$-convex} polygons, a particularly interesting class, and show how to recognize them in \mbox{$O(n \log n)$} time. A description of their shape is given as well, which leads to Erd\H{o}s-Szekeres type results regarding subconfigurations of their vertex sets. Finally, we introduce the concept of generalized geometric permutations, and show that their number can be exponential in the number of \mbox{$2$-convex} objects considered.Comment: 23 pages, 19 figure