arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to S. Tabachnikov.
We find new necessary and sufficient conditions for the bicycling monodromy of a closed plane curve to be hyperbolic. Our main tool is the ``hyperbolic development" interpretation of the bicycling monodromy of plane curves. Based on computer experiments, we pose two conjectures concerning the bicycling monodromy of strictly convex closed plane curves.
Two polygons, $(P_1,\ldots,P_n)$ and $(Q_1,\ldots,Q_n)$ in ${\mathbb R}^2$ are $c$-related if $\det(P_i, P_{i+1})=\det(Q_i, Q_{i+1})$ and $\det(P_i, Q_i)=c$ for all $i$. This relation extends to twisted polygons (polygons with monodromy), and it descends to the moduli space of $SL(2,{\mathbb R}^2)$-equivalent polygons. This relation is an equiaffine analog of the discrete bicycle correspondence studied by a number of authors. We study the geometry of this relations, present its integrals, and show that, in an appropriate sense, these relations, considered for different values of the constants $c$, commute. We relate this topic with the dressing chain of Veselov and Shabat. The case of small-gons is investigated in detail.
This is a collection of open problems from workshop "Differential Geometry, Billiards, and Geometric Optics" at CIRM on October 4-8, 2021.
The paper surveys open problems and questions related to different aspects of integrable systems with finitely many degrees of freedom. Many of the open problems were suggested by the participants of the conference "Finite-dimensional Integrable Systems, FDIS 2017" held at CRM, Barcelona in July 2017.
This is a survey of select recent results by a number of authors, inspired by the classical configuration theorems of projective geometry.
The locus of the centers of mass of the family of Poncelet polygons, inscribed into a conic $\Gamma$ and circumscribed about a conic $\gamma$, is a conic homothetic to $\Gamma$.
We consider the following problem: given two parallel and identically oriented bundles of light rays in n-dimensional Euclidean space and given a diffeomorphism between the rays of the former bundle and the rays of the latter one, is it possible to realize this diffeomorphism by means of several mirror reflections? We prove that a 2-mirror realization is possible if and only if the diffeomorphism is the gradient of a function. We further prove that any orientation reversing diffeomorphism of domains in the plane is locally the composition of two gradient diffeomorphisms, and therefore can be realized by 4 mirror reflections of light rays in 3-space, while an orientation preserving diffeomorphism can be realized by 6 reflections. In general, we prove that an (orientation reversing or preserving) diffeomorphism of wave fronts of two normal families of light rays in 3-space can be realized by 6 or 7 reflections.
An affine Hopf fibration is a fibration of n-dimensional real affine space by p-dimensional pairwise skew affine subspaces. An example is a fibration of 3-space by pairwise skew lines, the result of the central projection of the classical Hopf fibration of 3-sphere. In this expository article, we describe the solution of the following problem: for which values of n and p does an affine Hopf fibration exist? The answer is given in terms of the Hurwitz-Radon function.
We study iterations of two classical constructions, the evolutes and involutes of plane curves, and we describe the limiting behavior of both constructions on a class of smooth curves with singularities given by their support functions. Next we study two kinds of discretizations of these constructions: the curves are replaced by polygons, and the evolutes are formed by the circumcenters of the triples of consecutive vertices, or by the incenters of the triples of consecutive sides. The space of polygons is a vector bundle over the space of the side directions, and both kinds of evolutes define vector bundle morphisms. In both cases, we describe the linear maps of the fibers. In the first case, the induced map of the base is periodic, whereas, in the second case, it is an averaging transformation. We also study the dynamics of the related inverse constructions, the involutes of polygons. In addition to the theoretical study, we performed numerous computer experiments; some of the observations remain unexplained.
Given a Lagrangian submanifold in linear symplectic space, its tangent sweep is the union of its (affine) tangent spaces, and its tangent cluster is the result of parallel translating these spaces so that the foot point of each tangent space becomes the origin. This defines a multivalued map from the tangent sweep to the tangent cluster, and we show that this map is a local symplectomorphism (a well known fact, in dimension two). We define and study the outer billiard correspondence associated with a Lagrangian submanifold. Two points are in this correspondence if they belong to the same tangent space and are symmetric with respect to its foot pointe. We show that this outer billiard correspondence is symplectic and establish the existence of its periodic orbits. This generalizes the well studied outer billiard map in dimension two.
Suppose that to every non-degenerate simplex Delta in n-dimensional Euclidean space a `center' C(Delta) is assigned so that the following assumptions hold: (i) The map that assigns C(Delta) to Delta commutes with similarities and is invariant under the permutations of the vertices of the simplex; (ii) The map that assigns Vol(Delta) C(Delta) to Delta is polynomial in the coordinates of the vertices of the simplex. Then C(Delta) is an affine combination of the center of mass and the circumcenter of Delta (with the coefficients independent of the simplex). The motivation for this theorem comes from the recent study of the circumcenter of mass of simplicial polytopes by the authors and by A. Akopyan.
The equitangent locus of a convex plane curve consists of the points from which the two tangent segments to the curve have equal length. The equitangent problem concerns the relation between the curve and its equitangent locus. An equitangent n-gon of a convex curve is a circumscribed n-gon whose vertices belong to the equitangent locus. We are interested in curves that admit 1-parameter families of equitangent n-gons. We use methods of sub-Riemannian geometry: we define a distribution on the space of polygons and study its bracket generating properties. 1-parameter families of equitangent polygons correspond to the curves, tangent to this distribution. This distribution is closely related with the Birkhoff distribution on the space of plane polygons with a fixed perimeter length whose study, in the framework of the billiard ball problem, was pioneered by Yu. Baryshnikov, V. Zharnitsky and J. Landsberg
The Tait-Kneser theorem states that the osculating circles of a plane curve with monotonic curvature are pairwise disjoint and nested. We discuss this theorem and a number of its variations.
Geometry of the tracks left by a bicycle is closely related with the so-called Prytz planimeter and with linear fractional transformations of the complex plane. We describe these relations, along with the history of the problem, and give a proof of a conjecture made by Menzin in 1906.
Let M be a smooth strictly convex closed surface in space and denote by H the set of points x in the exterior of M such that all the tangent segments from x to M have equal lengths. In this note we prove that if H is either a closed surface containing M or a plane then M is an Euclidean sphere. Moreover, we shall see that the situation in the Euclidean plane is very different.
Given a plane oval, is it possible to go around it so that, at all times, the two tangent segments to the oval from the moving point have unequal lengths? In this note we construct an example of such an oval.
Complete integrability in a symplectic setting means the existence of a Lagrangian foliation leaf-wise preserved by the dynamics. In the paper we describe complete integrability in a contact set-up as a more subtle structure: a flag of two foliations, Legendrian and co-Legendrian, and a holonomy-invariant transverse measure of the former in the latter. This turns out to be equivalent to the existence of a canonical $\R\ltimes \R^{n-1}$ structure on the leaves of the co-Legendrian foliation. Further, the above structure implies the existence of $n$ contact fields preserving a special contact 1-form, thus providing the geometric framework and establishing equivalence with previously known definitions of contact integrability. We also show that contact completely integrable systems are solvable in quadratures. We present an example of contact complete integrability: the billiard system inside an ellipsoid in pseudo-Euclidean space, restricted to the space of oriented null geodesics. We describe a surprising acceleration mechanism for closed light-like billiard trajectories.
Many classical facts in Riemannian geometry have their pseudo-Riemannian analogs. For instance, the spaces of space-like and time-like geodesics on a pseudo-Riemannian manifold have natural symplectic structures (just like in the Riemannian case), while the space of light-like geodesics has a natural contact structure. We discuss the geometry of these structures in detail, as well as introduce and study pseudo-Euclidean billiards. In particular, we prove pseudo-Euclidean analogs of the Jacobi-Chasles theorems and show the integrability of the billiard in the ellipsoid and the geodesic flow on the ellipsoid in a pseudo-Euclidean space.