Related papers: On the number of pairwise touching cylinders in $\…

Let $N$ denote the maximum number of congruent infinite cylinders that can be arranged in $\mathbb{R}^3$ so that every pair of cylinders touches each other. Littlewood posed the question of whether $N=7$, which remains unsolved. In this…

Littlewood asked for the maximum number $N$ of congruent infinite cylinders that can be arranged in $\mathbb{R}^3$ so that every pair touches. We improve upon the proof of the second author that $N \leq 18$ to show that $N \leq 10$.…

We solve a problem of Littlewood: there exist seven infinite circular cylinders of unit radius which mutually touch each other. In fact, we exhibit two such sets of cylinders. Our approach is algebraic and uses symbolic and numerical…

Recently we gave arguments that only two unique topologically different configurations of 7 equal all mutually touching round cylinders (the configurations being mirror reflections of each other) are possible in 3D, although a whole world…

We provide a complete classification of possible configurations of mutually pairwise touching infinite cylinders in Euclidian 3D space. It turns out that there is a maximum number of such cylinders possible in 3D independently on the shape…

Motivated by a question of W. Kuperberg, we study the 18-dimensional manifold of configurations of 6 non-intersecting infinite cylinders of radius $r,$ all touching the unit ball in $\mathbb{R}^{3}.$ We find a configuration with \[…

It has been a challenge to make seven straight round cylinders mutually touch before our now 10-year old discovery [Phys. Rev. Lett. 93, 015505 (2004)] of configurations of seven mutually touching infinitely long round cylinders (then…

We consider the Poisson cylinder model in ${\mathbb R}^d$, $d\ge 3$. We show that given any two cylinders ${\mathfrak c}_1$ and ${\mathfrak c}_2$ in the process, there is a sequence of at most $d-2$ other cylinders creating a connection…

Given a set of planar curves (Jordan arcs), each pair of which meets -- either crosses or touches -- exactly once, we establish an upper bound on the number of touchings. We show that such a curve family has $O(t^2n)$ touchings, where $t$…

We consider the problem of finding the maximum number $e_d(n)$ of pairs of touching circles in a packing of $n$ congruent circles of diameter $d$ in the hyperbolic plane of curvature $-1$. In the Euclidean plane, the maximum comes from a…

The maximum possible number of non-overlapping unit spheres that can touch a unit sphere in $n$ dimensions is called kissing number. The problem for finding kissing numbers is closely connected to the more general problems of finding bounds…

Let $C(n)$ be the solution to the contact number problem, i.e., the maximum number of touching pairs among any packing of $n$ congruent spheres in $\mathbb{R}^3$. We prove the long conjectured values of $C(6)=12, C(7)=15$, and $C(8)=18$.…

In the early 1990s, A. Bezdek and W. Kuperberg used a relatively simple argument to show a surprising result: The maximum packing density of circular cylinders of infinite length in $\mathbb{R}^3$ is exactly $\pi/\sqrt{12}$, the planar…

Let H be a closed half-space of n-dimensional Euclidean space. Suppose S is a unit sphere in H that touches the supporting hyperplane of H. The one-sided kissing number B(n) is the maximal number of unit nonoverlapping spheres in H that can…

L\'{a}szl\'{o} Fejes T\'{o}th and Alad\'{a}r Heppes proposed the following generalization of the kissing number problem. Given a ball in $\mathbb{R}^d$, consider a family of balls touching it, and another family of balls touching the first…

Let the kissing number $K(d)$ be the maximum number of non-overlapping unit balls in $\mathbb R^d$ that can touch a given unit ball. Determining or estimating the number $K(d)$ has a long history, with the value of $K(3)$ being the subject…

The contact number of a packing of finitely many balls in Euclidean $d$-space is the number of touching pairs of balls in the packing. A prominent subfamily of sphere packings is formed by the so-called totally separable sphere packings:…

Let $p_1,p_2,p_3$ be three distinct points in the plane, and, for $i=1,2,3$, let $\mathcal C_i$ be a family of $n$ unit circles that pass through $p_i$. We address a conjecture made by Sz\'ekely, and show that the number of points incident…

Given $n$ continuous open curves in the plane, we say that a pair is touching if they have only one interior point in common and at this point the first curve does not get from one side of the second curve to its other side. Otherwise, if…

The kissing number k(3) is the maximal number of equal size nonoverlapping spheres in three dimensions that can touch another sphere of the same size. This number was the subject of a famous discussion between Isaac Newton and David Gregory…