45 research outputs found
Riesz external field problems on the hypersphere and optimal point separation
We consider the minimal energy problem on the unit sphere in
the Euclidean space in the presence of an external field
, where the energy arises from the Riesz potential (where is the
Euclidean distance and is the Riesz parameter) or the logarithmic potential
. Characterization theorems of Frostman-type for the associated
extremal measure, previously obtained by the last two authors, are extended to
the range The proof uses a maximum principle for measures
supported on . When is the Riesz -potential of a signed
measure and , our results lead to explicit point-separation
estimates for -Fekete points, which are -point configurations
minimizing the Riesz -energy on with external field . In
the hyper-singular case , the short-range pair-interaction enforces
well-separation even in the presence of more general external fields. As a
further application, we determine the extremal and signed equilibria when the
external field is due to a negative point charge outside a positively charged
isolated sphere. Moreover, we provide a rigorous analysis of the three point
external field problem and numerical results for the four point problem.Comment: 35 pages, 4 figure