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26 votes
2 answers
4k views

3D models of the unfoldings of the hypercube?

There are (apparently) 261 distinct unfoldings of the 4D hypercube, a.k.a., the tesseract, into 3D.1 These unfoldings (or "nets") are analogous to the 11 unfoldings of the 3D cube into the plane.2 ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
27 votes
3 answers
13k views

Which unfoldings of the hypercube tile 3-space: How to check for isometric space-fillers?

Recently Mark McClure constructed and displayed the 261 unfoldings of the hypercube (tesseract) in response to the question, "3D models of the unfoldings of the hypercube?": The first 9 unfoldings ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
96 votes
4 answers
5k views

A curious relation between angles and lengths of edges of a tetrahedron

Consider a Euclidean tetrahedron with lengths of edges $$ l_{12}, l_{13}, l_{14}, l_{23}, l_{24}, l_{34} $$ and dihedral angles $$ \alpha_{12}, \alpha_{13}, \alpha_{14}, \alpha_{23}, \alpha_{24}, \...
Daniil Rudenko's user avatar
28 votes
5 answers
2k views

Visibility of vertices in polyhedra

Suppose $P$ is a closed polyhedron in space (i.e. a union of polygons which is homeomorphic to $S^2$) and $X$ is an interior point of $P$. Is it true that $X$ can see at least one vertex of $P$? More ...
Mostafa - Free Palestine's user avatar
25 votes
3 answers
994 views

Does every convex polyhedron have a combinatorially isomorphic counterpart whose faces all have rational areas?

Does every convex polyhedron have a combinatorially isomorphic counterpart whose faces all have rational areas? Does every convex polyhedron have a combinatorially isomorphic counterpart whose edges ...
Liu Jin Tsai's user avatar
18 votes
1 answer
678 views

Higher dimensional generalization of: Any quadrilateral tiles the plane?

Any (non-self-intersecting) quadrilateral tiles the plane.     (MathWorld image.) Q. What is the strongest known generalization of this statement to higher dimensions? I.e., $\mathbb{R}^d$ ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
18 votes
2 answers
986 views

"Derived" polyhedra and polytopes

The notion of derived polygon is natural and leads to remarkable convergence. Start with a polygon, and replace it by locating a point on every edge a fraction $\alpha$ between the two endpoints. For ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
11 votes
1 answer
652 views

How to correctly state Cauchy's rigidity theorem?

Cauchy's rigidity theorem is often stated briefly as Any two (convex, 3-dimensional) polyhedra with pairwise congruent faces are themselves congruent. As a more formal generalization to general ...
M. Winter's user avatar
  • 13.6k
9 votes
0 answers
543 views

Maximum volume convex body coverable by a unit square

Suppose you are given a single unit square, and you are permitted to cut it into $k$ (connected) pieces (where $k=1$ means just the square). Your task is to construct the largest volume convex body ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
45 votes
1 answer
2k views

Pach's "Animals": What if the genus is positive?

Janos Pach asked a deep question 23 years ago (1988) that remains unsolved today: Can every animal—a topological ball in $\mathbb{R^3}$ composed of unit cubes glued face-to-face—be ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
34 votes
4 answers
2k views

About the ratio of the areas of a convex pentagon and the inner pentagon made by the five diagonals

Question : Letting $S{^\prime}$ be the area of the inner pentagon made by the five diagonals of a convex pentagon whose area is $S$, then find the max of $\frac{S^\prime}{S}$.     ...
mathlove's user avatar
  • 4,757
24 votes
1 answer
1k views

Which unfoldings of the $d$-dimensional hypercube tile $(d{-}1)$-space?

A six year old question, Which unfoldings of the hypercube tile $3$-space?, has just been answered by Moritz Firsching: All $261$ unfoldings tile space! So now we know: For $d=2$, the unfolding of ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
20 votes
4 answers
950 views

The limit of edge-midpoint convex polyhedra

    Starting with a convex polyhedron $P_1 \subset \mathbb{R}^3$, replace that with $P_2$, the convex hull of the midpoints of the edges of $P_1$. Continuing this process, we obtain a ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
15 votes
1 answer
530 views

Dividing a polyhedron into two similar copies

The paper Dividing a polygon into two similar polygons proves that there are only three families of polygons that are irrep-2-tiles (can be subdivided into similar copies of the original). Right ...
Kepler's Triangle's user avatar
14 votes
12 answers
1k views

Database of integer edge lengths that can form tetrahedrons

Is there a collection of lists of six integer edge lengths that form a tetrahedron? Is there a computer program for generating such lists? I need to find approximately thirty such tetrahedral ...
Pierre Humbert Leblanc's user avatar
14 votes
0 answers
479 views

Does every convex polyhedron have a combinatorially isomorphic counterpart whose angles between edges are rational multiples of $\pi$?

After reading these very interesting questions, I came up with another one: Does every convex polyhedron have a combinatorially isomorphic counterpart whose angles between all pairs of edges meeting ...
Piotr Shatalin's user avatar
13 votes
0 answers
573 views

What are the known convex polyhedra with congruent faces?

Note: I originally asked this question on math.SE here, where I posted a bounty on the question but received no answers after a week despite apparent interest in the problem. I'm hoping MathOverflow ...
RavenclawPrefect's user avatar
10 votes
1 answer
623 views

Polyhedron not circumscribed about a sphere

Let $P$ be a polyhedron whose faces are colored black and white so that there are more black faces and no two black faces are adjacent. Show that $P$ is not circumscribed about a sphere. My teacher ...
shadow10's user avatar
  • 1,090
9 votes
1 answer
282 views

Thinnest covering of the plane by regular pentagons

Q. Is it known what is the thinnest covering of the infinite plane by regular pentagons? By covering I mean every point of the plane is covered. By thinnest I mean the proportion of the plane covered ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
7 votes
3 answers
412 views

Average caliper diameter (mean width) of a polyhedron

Define the caliper diameter of a polyhedron as follows: Let $P_1$ and $P_2$ be two planes both of which are parallel to the x axis such that the perpendicular distance between $P_1$ and $P_2$ is the ...
JDoe2's user avatar
  • 101
7 votes
2 answers
392 views

Convex deltahedra in higher dimensions

There are eight convex polyhedra whose faces are equilateral triangles, so-called deltahedra:        (Image from here) Q. Have the equivalent higher-dimensional ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
6 votes
1 answer
264 views

Can a dodecahedron be deformed into a great stellated dodecahedron?

Can a convex regular dodecahedron be deformed into a great stellated dodecahedron while keeping all pentagons planar and all edges of nonzero length the whole time?
Daniel Sebald's user avatar
5 votes
3 answers
683 views

Alexandrov's generalization of Cauchy's rigidity theorem

Wikipedia states that A. D. Alexandrov generalized Cauchy's rigidity theorem for polyhedra to higher dimensions. The relevant statement in the article is not linked to any source. The sources at the ...
M. Winter's user avatar
  • 13.6k
5 votes
1 answer
246 views

Convex polyhedra with non-congruent faces

Question: Are there convex polyhedra wherein all faces are convex polygons with same area and perimeter and no two faces are mutually congruent? Remarks: If the answer to above is "no", then,...
Nandakumar R's user avatar
  • 5,979
4 votes
1 answer
131 views

Any visualization software for the intrinsic metric of a convex polyhedron?

I'd like to find a visual simulation of what it would be like to 'live' in a polyhedron with the intrinsic, piecewise-Euclidean length metric. Of course, to make it easier to visualize, I'd prefer to ...
Brian Rushton's user avatar
2 votes
0 answers
94 views

Dodecahedron deformation II

(Follow-up to this question) Can a dodecahedron be deformed into a great stellated dodecahedron while maintaining the number of dimensions each element occupies?
Daniel Sebald's user avatar