Hyperplane Arrangements with Large Average Diameter

The largest possible average diameter of a bounded cell of a simple hyperplane arrangement is conjectured to be not greater than the dimension. We prove that this conjecture holds in dimension 2, and is asymptotically tight in fixed dimension. We give the exact value of the largest possible average diameter for all simple arrangements in dimension 2, for arrangements having at most the dimension plus 2 hyperplanes, and for arrangements having 6 hyperplanes in dimension 3. In dimension 3, we give lower and upper bounds which are both asymptotically equal to the dimension

A Simple Bijection for the Regions of the Shi Arrangement of Hyperplanes

The Shi arrangement ${\mathcal S}_n$ is the arrangement of affine hyperplanes in ${\mathbb R}^n$ of the form $x_i - x_j = 0$ or $1$, for $1 \leq i < j \leq n$. It dissects ${\mathbb R}^n$ into $(n+1)^{n-1}$ regions, as was first proved by Shi. We give a simple bijective proof of this result. Our bijection generalizes easily to any subarrangement of ${\mathcal S}_n$ containing the hyperplanes $x_i - x_j = 0$ and to the extended Shi arrangements

Enumerating Colorings, Tensions and Flows in Cell Complexes

We study quasipolynomials enumerating proper colorings, nowhere-zero tensions, and nowhere-zero flows in an arbitrary CW-complex $X$, generalizing the chromatic, tension and flow polynomials of a graph. Our colorings, tensions and flows may be either modular (with values in $\mathbb{Z}/k\mathbb{Z}$ for some $k$) or integral (with values in $\{-k+1,\dots,k-1\}$). We obtain deletion-contraction recurrences and closed formulas for the chromatic, tension and flow quasipolynomials, assuming certain unimodularity conditions. We use geometric methods, specifically Ehrhart theory and inside-out polytopes, to obtain reciprocity theorems for all of the aforementioned quasipolynomials, giving combinatorial interpretations of their values at negative integers as well as formulas for the numbers of acyclic and totally cyclic orientations of $X$.Comment: 28 pages, 3 figures. Final version, to appear in J. Combin. Theory Series

LR characterization of chirotopes of finite planar families of pairwise disjoint convex bodies

We extend the classical LR characterization of chirotopes of finite planar families of points to chirotopes of finite planar families of pairwise disjoint convex bodies: a map \c{hi} on the set of 3-subsets of a finite set I is a chirotope of finite planar families of pairwise disjoint convex bodies if and only if for every 3-, 4-, and 5-subset J of I the restriction of \c{hi} to the set of 3-subsets of J is a chirotope of finite planar families of pairwise disjoint convex bodies. Our main tool is the polarity map, i.e., the map that assigns to a convex body the set of lines missing its interior, from which we derive the key notion of arrangements of double pseudolines, introduced for the first time in this paper.Comment: 100 pages, 73 figures; accepted manuscript versio

Fiber polytopes for the projections between cyclic polytopes

The cyclic polytope $C(n,d)$ is the convex hull of any $n$ points on the moment curve ${(t,t^2,...,t^d):t \in \reals}$ in $\reals^d$. For $d' >d$, we consider the fiber polytope (in the sense of Billera and Sturmfels) associated to the natural projection of cyclic polytopes $\pi: C(n,d') \to C(n,d)$ which "forgets" the last $d'-d$ coordinates. It is known that this fiber polytope has face lattice indexed by the coherent polytopal subdivisions of $C(n,d)$ which are induced by the map $\pi$. Our main result characterizes the triples $(n,d,d')$ for which the fiber polytope is canonical in either of the following two senses: - all polytopal subdivisions induced by $\pi$ are coherent, - the structure of the fiber polytope does not depend upon the choice of points on the moment curve. We also discuss a new instance with a positive answer to the Generalized Baues Problem, namely that of a projection $\pi:P\to Q$ where $Q$ has only regular subdivisions and $P$ has two more vertices than its dimension.Comment: 28 pages with 1 postscript figur