On the Kneser-Poulsen conjecture in elliptic space (Q858594)

The Kneser-Poulsen conjecture is the claim that if finitely many balls in Euclidean space are rearranged so that the distances between the centers do not increase, then neither does the volume of the union of the balls. See \textit{M. Kneser} [Arch. Math. 6, 382--390 (1955; Zbl 0065.04001)] and \textit{E.T. Poulsen} [Math. Scand. 2, 346 (1954)]. This result has been established in the Euclidean plane by \textit{K. Bezdek} and \textit{R. Connelly} [J. Reine Angew. Math. 553, 221--236 (2002; Zbl 1021.52012)]. It remains open in dimension \(\geq 3\). A version in which the balls move continuously in such a way that the distances between the centers decrease during the motion has been proved in Euclidean, hyperbolic, and spherical spaces. The authors show that this version does not hold in elliptic space, that is, real projective space with the Riemannian metric inherited from the sphere. Their counterexample consists of a set of 3 balls in elliptic space which move in a way that the centers get closer to one another, but the volume of their union strictly increases during the motion. On the other hand, the authors prove that a set of \(n+1\) balls in \(n\)-dimensional elliptic space in which the distances between the centers is as large as possible, that is \(\pi/2\), cover the maximal possible volume.