On the density of 2-saturated lattice packings of discs (Q5956993)

A packing of unit discs in the plane is called 2-saturated if none of the discs can be replaced by two others of the same size to give a new packing. Obviously, the density of a 2-saturated packing cannot be too small. It has been conjectured that the greatest lower bound of the density of a 2-saturated packing of congruent discs is \({(3-\sqrt{5})\pi\over \sqrt{27}}\simeq 0.46\); this is the density of a triangular (hexagonal) lattice packing of unit discs with adajcent discs a distance \({\sqrt{3}(\sqrt{1+\sqrt{5}})\over 2}\) apart. The author confirms this conjecture in the case of lattice packings. But in order to study this problem in a more general form he introduces a new notion, the 2-saturation radius \(r_{2\text{sat}}\): this is the largest radius \(r\) such that a unit disc of the packing can be replaced by two discs of radius \(r\) to give another packing. He finds lower bounds for \(r_{2\text{sat}}\): the minimum occurs for triangular, square, or interpolating rhombic lattices depending on the density of the lattice. Similarly upper bounds for \(r_{2\text{sat}}\) occur in various types of lattices depending on the density.