Related papers: Packing a cake into a box

In Martin Gardner's October, 1976 Mathematical Games column in Scientific American, he posed the following problem: "What is the smallest number of [queens] you can put on a board of side n such that no [queen] can be added without creating…

We study the problem of perfect tiling in the plane and exploring the possibility of tiling a rectangle using integral distinct squares. Assume a set of distinguishable squares (or equivalently a set of distinct natural numbers) is given,…

When my brilliant student Thotsaporn "Aek" Thanatipanonda asked me about how many ways can one cover n identical twins, it rang a Bell back to 1981 (see the article). As usual, the method of teaching the computer how to do its own…

A plank is the part of space between two parallel planes. The following open problem, posed 45 years ago, can be viwed as the converse of Tarski's plank problem (Bang's theorem): Is it true that if the total width of a collection of planks…

Relying on configuration spaces and equivariant topology, we study a general "cooperative envy-free division problem". A group of players want to cut a "cake" $I=[0,1]$ and divide among themselves the pieces in an envy-free manner. Once the…

We consider decompositions of the real line into pairwise disjoint Borel pieces so that each piece is closed under addition. How many pieces can there be? We prove among others that the number of pieces is either at most 3 or uncountable,…

We discuss several coin-weighing problems in which coins are known to be of three different weights and only a balance scale can be used. We start with the task of sorting coins when the pans of the scale can fit only one coin. We prove…

In an Euclidean $d$-space, the container problem asks to pack $n$ equally sized spheres into a minimal dilate of a fixed container. If the container is a smooth convex body and $d\geq 2$ we show that solutions to the container problem can…

We prove that an odd pretzel knot is doubly slice if it has $2n+1$ twist parameters consisting of $n+1$ copies of $a$ and $n$ copies of $-a$ for some odd integer $a$. Combined with the work of Issa and McCoy, it follows that these are the…

Jigsaw puzzles are typically labeled with their finished area and number of pieces. With this information, is it possible to estimate the area required to lay each piece flat before assembly? We derive a simple formula based on…

We give a complete characterization of the topological slice status of odd 3-strand pretzel knots, proving that an odd 3-strand pretzel knot is topologically slice if and only if either it is ribbon or has trivial Alexander polynomial. (By…

The aim in packing problems is to decide if a given set of pieces can be placed inside a given container. A packing problem is defined by the types of pieces and containers to be handled, and the motions that are allowed to move the pieces.…

The ball number of a link $L$, denoted by $ball(L)$, is the minimum number of solid balls (not necessarily of the same size) needed to realize a necklace representing $L$. In this paper, we show that $ball(L)\leq 5 cr(L)$ where $cr(L)$…

We give a necessary, and in some cases sufficient, condition for sliceness inside the family of pretzel knots $P (p_1,...,p_n)$ with one $p_i$ even. The three stranded case yields two interesting families of examples: the first consists of…

Which polyominoes can be folded into a cube, using only creases along edges of the square lattice underlying the polyomino, with fold angles of $\pm 90^\circ$ and $\pm 180^\circ$, and allowing faces of the cube to be covered multiple times?…

The $k$-coverage problem is to find the minimum number of disks such that each point in a given plane is covered by at least $k$ disks. Under unit disk condition, when $k$=1, this problem has been solved by Kershner in 1939. However, when…

What topological spaces can be partitioned into copies of the Cantor space $2^\omega$? An obvious necessary condition is that a space can be partitioned into copies of $2^\omega$ only if it can be covered with copies of $2^\omega$. We prove…

Given a set $P$ of $n$ points in the plane, where $n$ is even, we consider the following question: How many plane perfect matchings can be packed into $P$? We prove that at least $\lceil\log_2{n}\rceil-2$ plane perfect matchings can be…

Given a point (the "spider") on a rectangular box, we would like to find the minimal distance along the surface to its opposite point (the "fly" - the reflection of the spider across the center of the box). Without loss of generality, we…

It was recently proved that every claw-free cubic graph admits a (1, 1, 2, 2)-packing coloring--that is, its vertex set can be partitioned into two 1-packings and two 2-packings. This result was established by Bre\v{s}ar, Kuenzel, and Rall…