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2 votes
1 answer
312 views

Question on a vector inequality

Is it true that $$ \min\left( \begin{aligned} &\|\mathbf{u}\| + \|\mathbf{v}\| - \|\mathbf{u} + \mathbf{v}\|, \\ &\|\mathbf{u}\| + \|\mathbf{w}\| - \|\mathbf{u} + \mathbf{w}\|, \\ &\|\...
0 votes
1 answer
114 views

Geometric interpretation of a Grammian-like function

Let $\mathbf{v}, \mathbf{w} \in \mathbb{R}^n$ and consider the following function $f : \mathbb{R}^n \times \mathbb{R}^n \rightarrow \mathbb{R}$: $$ f(\mathbf{v},\mathbf{w}) = \|\mathbf{v}\|\|\mathbf{w}...
2 votes
0 answers
38 views

Constructing an $n$-simplex at the border of a $n$-ball by orthogonal hyperplanes

I want to construct an $n$-simplex the following way: Choose $n$ vectors in the boundary of an $n$ dimensional ball, which are forming an $(n-1)$-simplex together. Place the orthogonal affine $n-1$-...
1 vote
0 answers
27 views

Seeking Help with Classifying Polygons: Waterholes and Airpockets in 2D Space

I am currently in the process of writing software and have encountered a mathematical problem. Perhaps there are some experts here who are familiar with this. It involves the classification of ...
1 vote
1 answer
132 views

Can I find $n$ points on the boundary of an $n$-dimensional ball with certain properties?

My problem is the following: I want to construct $n$ rays all starting at a point $v$ that is not in the $n$-dimensional ball around $0$ such that the following is true: The $n$-dimensional ball is a ...
0 votes
0 answers
96 views

When can a point be reconstructed from relative angle measurements?

Given a set of points $p_1,\dots,p_n$ in $\mathbb{R}^d$ and a target point $x\in\mathbb{R}^d$, I measure all the angles between all pairs of points and the target point. In other words, I have the ...
2 votes
1 answer
237 views

Geometric interpretation of trace of a linear operator

This question is really an addendum to Geometric interpretation of trace There is a nice account of the trace in Chris Doran's thesis here: http://geometry.mrao.cam.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/...
0 votes
0 answers
28 views

Example of a matrix -HDH that is not PSD (with non-euclidean distances D)

It's widely known that, given a matrix of squared Euclidean distances, $\mathbf{D}_{ij} = \| \mathbf{X}_i - \mathbf{X}_j \|^2$, and the centering matrix $\mathbf{H} = \mathbf{I} - \dfrac{1}{n}11^T$, ...
5 votes
0 answers
137 views

Given a collection of vectors $x_1,\ldots,x_k$, which inner products $\langle x_i,x_j\rangle$ are needed to uniquely determine all inner products

Given a collection of vectors $x_1,\ldots,x_k$, which inner products $\langle x_i,x_j\rangle$ need to be known to uniquely determine all inner products? I'll begin with the specific case I am ...
1 vote
0 answers
43 views

Intersection of unit-norm vectors with a large sum in high dimensions with a spherical cap

Let $d$ and $n$ be integers. For $i \in \lbrace 1,\dots,n \rbrace$ let $x_i \in \mathbb{R}^d$ be a vector such that $\lVert x \rVert=1 $. For a fixed $1/2 < \alpha \leq 1$, assume we have $\lVert \...
1 vote
1 answer
184 views

Average distance between points of lower dimensional simplices in $\mathbb R^n$

Notation: By a simplex, we mean the convex hull of a finite set of distinct points in $\mathbb R^n$, which are called the vertices of the simplex. $\mathcal H^n$ will denote the $n$-dimensional ...
4 votes
1 answer
491 views

Generalization of the "double cap conjecture" to a vector space with complex field

The conjecture that I proposed in Maximal set on hypersphere that does not contain pairs of orthogonal vectors is in fact known as the "double cap conjecture", as noted by Guillaume Aubrun. See for ...
5 votes
1 answer
167 views

What structure is preserved by pseudo-homeomorphisms of pseudo-Euclidean spaces?

Let us recall that for integer numbers $t,s\ge 0$ the pseudo-Euclidean space $\mathbb R^{t,s}$ is the vector space $\mathbb R^{t+s}$ endowed with the quadratic form $q_{t,s}:\mathbb R^{t+s}\to\mathbb ...
6 votes
2 answers
539 views

Conditions for including cones

Consider $N$ $n$-dimensional vectors, where the angle between any two vectors is acute and their starting point is at the origin. Can we rotate these vectors together so that the coordinate components ...
5 votes
2 answers
134 views

Is there a non-orthogonal linear deformation of a polytope that preserves edge-lengths and vertex-origin-distances?

Is there a polytope $P\subset\Bbb R^d$ (convex hull of finitely many points, not contained in a proper affine subspace), and a linear, but non-orthogonal transformation $T\in\mathrm{GL}(\Bbb R^d)\...
2 votes
0 answers
233 views

Do you know this formula for the scalar product in barycentric coordinates?

I've found a formula for a scalar product in barycentric coordinates which I think is pretty cool. I hope that it's new. Is it? Suppose that you have points $x_1,\dots,x_n$ sitting in general position ...
4 votes
1 answer
232 views

Is the affine geometry a geometry of proportions?

Given any linear space $L$ over an ordered field $F$, consider the equiproportion relation $${\sim}=\{((x,y,z),(a,b,c))\in L^3\times L^3: \exists t\in[0,1]\subseteq F\;(y{-}x=t(z{-}x)\wedge b{-}a=t(c{-...
5 votes
3 answers
543 views

Finding a hyperplane that splits a convex polytope evenly

Say we have a convex polytope in standard form: \begin{equation*} \begin{array}{rl} \mathbf{A}\mathbf{x} = \mathbf{b} \\\\ \mathbf{x} \ge 0 \end{array} \end{equation*} Are there any known methods ...
1 vote
0 answers
34 views

Maximum number of concurrencies for $J\cdot L$ hyperplanes in $\mathbb{R}^{J-1}$

I have $J\cdot L$ hyperplanes in $\mathbb{R}^{J-1}$ and want to prove that there cannot be more than $L$ points where $J$ hyperplanes intersect simultaneously (aka. concurrencies). I suspect that the ...
9 votes
2 answers
1k views

Other norms for lattice reduction techniques (LLL, PSLQ)?

LLL and other lattice reduction techniques (such as PSLQ) try to find a short basis vector relative to the 2-norm, i.e. for a given basis that has $ \varepsilon $ as its shortest vector, $ \varepsilon ...
1 vote
0 answers
109 views

Relation between the dimension of vector spaces and dimension of the space [closed]

Let $A \in \mathrm{GL}(d, \mathbb{R})$ be an irreducible matrix. Assume that $\{V_{n}\}_{n\in \mathbb{N}}$ is a non-zero proper subspace $\mathbb{R}^d$ with dimension $t<d,$ such that $AV_{n}=V_{n+...
1 vote
1 answer
81 views

Generate an ordered set of mostly orthogonal vectors $\{x_i\}$ where $x_i \cdot x_j =0$ iff $\lvert i-j\rvert >m$

I am wondering if there is a way to formulate or generate a matrix $X \in R^{n\times n}$ whose column vectors $\{x_1,\dotsc,x_i,\dotsc,x_n\}$ are such that $x_i$ and $x_j$ are orthogonal iff $\lvert i-...
0 votes
1 answer
445 views

Standard Gram matrices for lattices

I would like to define standard Gram matrices, and use them to help me understand the symmetries of lattices. I define "standard Gram matrix" as the Gram matrix g that minimizes the ...
1 vote
1 answer
137 views

Relationships among lattices U14, C2xG23, A15+ and their Delaunay polytopes

Do you have any references explaining the relationships among the lattices U14, C2xG23 aka Q14, and A15+? Do you have any references explaining the relationships among these lattices and the 7D ...
2 votes
2 answers
248 views

On an angle distribution of a random linear subspace of a given dimension

$\newcommand\R{\mathbb R}$ Let $u$ be a fixed unit vector in $\R^n$, and let $\Pi_u$ be the hyperplane in $\R^n$ with normal vector $u$. Let $B$ be the (say open) unit ball in $\R^n$ centered at the ...
1 vote
1 answer
428 views

Covering number in the space of symmetric matrices

Let $S_n(\mathbb{R})$ be the set of symmetric matrices of size $n \times n$. Note $\|\Theta\|_{0}$ the number of nonzero elements of a matrix $\Theta$ and $\|\cdot\|_F$ the Froebenius norm. Consider ...
1 vote
0 answers
70 views

Distance to set defined as subzero level set of a continuous function

I am searching for strategies on how to prove/disprove that scalar functions "capture" the distance to the subzero level set of the same function. (Or what topics to study to become better ...
1 vote
1 answer
319 views

Are there any applications of linear algebra over the complex numbers, where the role of complex conjugation is replaced with the trivial involution?

The complex inner product $\langle u, v \rangle$ is a special case of a sesquilinear form over a field. Its definition is $\langle u, v \rangle = \sum_{i} u_i \overline{v_i}$. There is clearly the ...
4 votes
3 answers
246 views

When does a finite metric induce a matrix norm?

If I have a metric $d(\cdot,\cdot)$ on the set $\{1,\dots,n\}$, are there well-known necessary or sufficient conditions for the existence of a matrix norm $Q$ that induces that metric on the unit ...
15 votes
4 answers
2k views

More than $n$ approximately orthonormal vectors in $R^n$

This question was asked at math.stackexchange, where it got several upvotes but no answers. It is impossible to find $n+1$ mutually orthonormal vectors in $R^n$. However, it is well established that ...
7 votes
0 answers
254 views

Set of unit vectors such that among any three there is an orthogonal pair

I was fascinated by the solutions of Problem 8 of the IMC 2021 contest, which can be summarized as: Theorem 1. Let $v_1,\dotsc,v_N$ be distinct unit vectors in $\mathbb{R}^n$ such that among any three ...
1 vote
0 answers
152 views

Reference request: a class of matrices leading to interesting metric geometry

For $0 \le A \in GL(n,\mathbb{R})$, let $Aw = \Delta(A)$, where $\Delta$ denotes the map taking a matrix to a vector of its diagonal entries and/or forming a diagonal matrix from a vector, according ...
16 votes
1 answer
537 views

Balls in Hilbert space

I recently noticed an interesting fact which leads to a perhaps difficult question. If $n$ is a natural number, let $k_n$ be the smallest number $k$ such that an open ball of radius $k$ in a real ...
4 votes
2 answers
492 views

The Aleksandrov-Fenchel inequality of mixed discriminants for Hermitian matrices

Suppose $A,A_1,\ldots,A_{n-2}$ (resp. $B$) are (resp. is) real positive-definite (resp. arbitrary) symmetric $n\times n$ matrices and denote by $D(\cdot,\ldots,\cdot)$ the mixed discriminant. We have ...
5 votes
0 answers
144 views

Do products of distance functions separate points?

Let $(X,d)$ be a metric space without isolated points and of diameter $1$. Let $Y=\{y_m\}_{m=1}^{\infty}$ be a dense subset of $X$. Define $g_0\equiv 1$, and for $m>0$ let $g_m=d(\cdot,y_1)\dotsm d(...
0 votes
0 answers
262 views

Lattice basis reductions and finding minimal values

While reading several articles about lattice basis reduction I am left with a few questions. For one, I came across this piece of text Let $\alpha$ and $\beta \in \mathbb{R}$. Also let $X>0$ and $...
2 votes
0 answers
46 views

signatures of quasi-gram matrices

Suppose I have a finite subset $\mathcal{M}$ of a Banach space $B$ $\mathcal{M}=p_1, \dots, p_n,$ and I create the following ``Gram'' matrix $G_{\mathcal{M}}:$ $$g_{ij} = \frac{\|p_i\|^2 + \|p_j\|^2 ...
4 votes
0 answers
223 views

$\epsilon$-net under Hausdorff distance

Consider linear subspaces of $\mathbb{R}^n$. For two subspaces $X$ and $Y$, we define their Hausdorff distance as $$ {\displaystyle d_{\mathrm {H} }(X,Y)=\max \left\{\,\sup _{x\in X, |x|_2=1}\inf ...
4 votes
1 answer
1k views

What is the average area of the shadow of a convex shape taken over all possible orientations?

If we take a sphere, its surface area is exactly 4 times the area of its shadow. How can it be generalised for any convex shape?
11 votes
2 answers
797 views

Three half circles on the plane may not meet nicely

Let $H$ denote the union of the northern hemisphere of the unit circle $S^{1}$ with the interval $[-1,1]$ on the $x$-axis. That is, $H=\{(x,\sqrt{1-x^{2}}):-1\le x\le 1\}\cup\{(x,0):-1\le x\le 1\}$ ...
3 votes
1 answer
1k views

Find a line such that sum of perpendicular distances of points to the line is minimized

Given a set of points (column vectors) $S = \{p_1, p_2, \cdots, p_n\} \subset \Re^d$, let $A \in \Re^{n \times d}$ be a matrix of which each row is just $p_i^T$. It is easy to find a unit vector $s_1$ ...
4 votes
0 answers
144 views

A Pythagorian inequality characterization of inner-product spaces

Let $(X,\|\cdot\|)$ be a real normed space. For any points $A$ and $B$ in $X$, let $AB:=\|A-B\|$. Suppose that for any points $A$ and $B$ in $X$ and any straight line $\ell\subseteq X$ such that $B\...
2 votes
0 answers
51 views

Find Line through the origin which minimizes the squared perpendicular distances to given points [closed]

Given a set of Points $p_i\in \Re^d$, I'm looking for the vector $x\in\Re^d$ with $\| x \|=1$ along a line so that minimizes $$\sum_{i}(\|p_i\|^2 - \langle p_i, x\rangle^2)$$ According to the first ...
1 vote
0 answers
1k views

How to project a matrix to a unitary matrix?

Given a nonzero vector $v \in \mathbb{R}^n$, we all know that it's projection onto the unit $\ell_2$ ball is just $\frac{v}{\|v\|}$. Let $X$ be some nonzero $n \times n$ matrix. What is the projection ...
6 votes
0 answers
217 views

Is this function embeddable in Euclidean space?

Let $X = \{v_1,\ldots,v_n\}$ be a set of vectors non-zero vectors $v_i \ge 0$ and such that the vectors are pairwise linear independent. Define a function on this set $X$: $$d(v,w) = 1-\frac{2 \...
5 votes
0 answers
350 views

How to calculate the volume of a parallelepiped in a normed space?

Let $E$ be a real normed space, and let $v_1,...,v_n\in E$ be linearly independent. The parallelepiped defined by these vectors is $P=\{\sum_{i=1}^{n}\alpha_i v_i|~0\le\alpha_i\le 1\}$. Since $E$ is a ...
13 votes
2 answers
795 views

Distance of vectors versus distance of their difference vectors

For any given $x \in \mathbb{R}^n$, let $\nabla{x} \in \mathbb{R}^{n \choose 2}$ be the vector whose $\{i,j\}$-th entry is $|x_i-x_j|$. I think the following claim is true. Claim. If $f, g \in \...
16 votes
1 answer
774 views

Minimizing the excursion of a sum of unit vectors

I have $n$ unit-length vectors $v_i$ in $\mathbb{R}^3$, whose sum is zero: $$ v_1 + v_2 + \cdots + v_n = 0 \; .$$ Now I form the closed polygon $P$ in space by placing them head to tail. So the ...
1 vote
1 answer
95 views

A question on a special "metric"

Suppose we have a function $F: [a,b]^n \to \mathcal{M}_{n \times n }(\mathbb{R})$ where $\mathcal{M}_{n \times n }(\mathbb{R})$ is the space of $n \times n$ real matrices, a compact set $B \subset \...
5 votes
0 answers
310 views

Biggest (or large) rectangle in a polytope

I need an efficient method to construct a (hyper)rectangle inside a polytope with a lot of dimensions (say $100 < d < 1000$). Ideally I'd want the biggest possible rectangle, but as I don't ...