English

On packing spheres into containers (about Kepler's finite sphere packing problem)

Metric Geometry 2011-10-20 v2

Abstract

In an Euclidean dd-space, the container problem asks to pack nn equally sized spheres into a minimal dilate of a fixed container. If the container is a smooth convex body and d2d\geq 2 we show that solutions to the container problem can not have a ``simple structure'' for large nn. By this we in particular find that there exist arbitrary small r>0r>0, such that packings in a smooth, 3-dimensional convex body, with a maximum number of spheres of radius rr, are necessarily not hexagonal close packings. This contradicts Kepler's famous statement that the cubic or hexagonal close packing ``will be the tightest possible, so that in no other arrangement more spheres could be packed into the same container''.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.math/0506200,
  title  = {On packing spheres into containers (about Kepler's finite sphere packing problem)},
  author = {Achill Schuermann},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:math/0506200},
  year   = {2011}
}

Comments

13 pages, 2 figures; v2: major revision, extended result, simplified and clarified proof

R2 v1 2026-07-22T17:20:32.426Z