Related papers: On the number of tiles visited by a line segment o…

First, we consider order-$n$ ribbon tilings of an $M$-by-$N$ rectangle $R_{M,N}$ where $M$ and $N$ are much larger than $n$. We prove the existence of the growth rate $\gamma_n$ of the number of tilings and show that $\gamma_n \leq (n-1)…

In 1974, Stoka solved Buffon's needle problem in $\mathbb{R}^d$, $d \ge 2$, i.e. he found a closed form solution for the probability that a line segment ("needle") with length $\ell$ intersects a grid of parallel hyperplanes with mutual…

A famous result of D. Walkup is that an $m\times n$ rectangle may be tiled by T-tetrominos if and only if both $m$ and $n$ are multiples of 4. The "if" portion may be proved by tiling a $4\times 4$ block, and then copying that block to fill…

This paper attacks the following problem. We are given a large number $N$ of rectangles in the plane, each with horizontal and vertical sides, and also a number $r<N$. The given list of $N$ rectangles may contain duplicates. The problem is…

Given a rectangular grid graph with a special vertex at a corner called base station, we study the problem of covering the vertices of the entire graph with tours that start and end at the base station and whose lengths do not exceed a…

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,…

Given a finite grid in $\mathbb{R}^2$, how many lines are needed to cover all but one point at least $k$ times? Problems of this nature have been studied for decades, with a general lower bound having been established by Ball and Serra. We…

We study tilings of the plane composed of two repeating tiles of different assigned areas relative to an arbitrary periodic lattice. We classify isoperimetric configurations (i.e., configurations with minimal length of the interfaces) both…

We study the tiling of a two-dimensional region of the plane by $K$-cell one-dimensional tiles, or $K$-mers. Unlike previous studies, which typically allowed for one single value of $K$ or sometimes a small assortment of fixed values, here…

This article shines new light on the classical problem of tiling rectangles with squares efficiently with a novel method. With a twist on the traditional approach of resistor networks, we provide new and improved results on the matter using…

In this paper we consider graphs whose edges are associated with a degree of {\em importance}, which may depend on the type of connections they represent or on how recently they appeared in the scene, in a streaming setting. The goal is to…

We study tilings of polygons $R$ with arbitrary convex polygonal tiles. Such tilings come in continuous families obtained by moving tile edges parallel to themselves (keeping edge directions fixed). We study how the tile shapes and areas…

The problem of rectangle tiling binary arrays is defined as follows. Given an $n \times n$ array $A$ of zeros and ones and a natural number $p$, our task is to partition $A$ into at most $p$ rectangular tiles, so that the maximal weight of…

Reachability and other path-based measures on temporal graphs can be used to understand spread of infection, information, and people in modelled systems. Due to delays and errors in reporting, temporal graphs derived from data are unlikely…

Logistics and transportation networks require a large amount of resources to realize necessary connections between locations and minimizing these resources is a vital aspect of planning research. Since such networks have dynamic connections…

The question of whether a given region can be successfully filled by a finite set of tiles has been commonly studied, and there are many available arguments for whether a given finite region can be tiled. We can show that there is no domino…

In this paper, we study tilings of $\mathbb Z$, that is, coverings of $\mathbb Z$ by disjoint sets (tiles). Let $T=\{d_1,\ldots, d_s\}$ be a given multiset of distances. Is it always possible to tile $\mathbb Z$ by tiles, for which the…

We consider the number of domino tilings of an odd-by-odd rectangle that leave one hole. This problem is equivalent to the number of near-perfect matchings of the odd-by-odd rectangular grid. For any particular position of the vacancy on…

We study three covering problems in the plane. Our original motivation for these problems come from trajectory analysis. The first is to decide whether a given set of line segments can be covered by up to four unit-sized, axis-parallel…

We study the systole of a random surface, where by a random surface we mean a surface constructed by randomly gluing together an even number of triangles. We study two types of metrics on these surfaces, the first one coming from using…