English

Total orders realizable as the distances between two sets of points

Combinatorics 2025-10-01 v4 Metric Geometry

Abstract

In this note we give a negative answer to a question proposed by Almendra-Hern\'andez and Mart\'inez-Sandoval. Let nmn\le m be positive integers and let XX and YY be sets of sizes nn and mm in Rn1\mathbb{R}^{n-1} such that every pair of points in XYX\cup Y defines a unique distance. There is a natural order on X×YX\times Y induced by the distances between the corresponding points. The question is if all possible orders on X×YX\times Y can be obtained in this way. We show that the answer is negative when n<mn<m. The case n=mn=m remains open.

Cite

@article{arxiv.2304.05535,
  title  = {Total orders realizable as the distances between two sets of points},
  author = {Gerardo L. Maldonado and Miguel Raggi Pérez and Edgardo Roldán-Pensado},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2304.05535},
  year   = {2025}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-28T10:00:51.426Z