On \(r\)-neighbourly submanifolds in \(\mathbb{R}^N\) (Q1282197)

Let \(f:M\to\mathbb{R}^N\) be a smooth embedding of a \(k\)-dimensional manifold \(M\) in the \(N\)-dimensional Euclidean space. \(f\) is called \(r\)-neighbourly if for any \(r\) points in \(M\) there exists an affine hyperplane in \(\mathbb{R}^N\) supporting \(M\) and touching it in exactly those \(r\) points. \(f\) is called stably \(r\)-neighbourly if it is \(r\)-neighbourly and any embedding \(M\to \mathbb{R}^N\) close to \(f\) in the \(C^2\)-topology is \(r\)-neighbourly. \(\Delta (M,r)\) denotes the minimal dimension \(N\) such that there exists a stably \(r\)-neighbourly embedding of \(M\) in \(\mathbb{R}^N\). The author gives lower bounds for the numbers \(\Delta(M,r)\) when \(M\) is \(\mathbb{R}^k\) or \(M\) is the real projective space \(\mathbb{R} P^k\). The proofs use Stiefel-Whitney classes and constructions with the \(r\)-th configuration space of \(M\).