Infinitesimal rigidity of almost-convex oriented polyhedra of arbitrary Euler characteristic (Q1117465)

This paper introduces a new method for proving the infinitesimal rigidity of a broad class of polyhedra, the caps-with-collars and their projective (Darboux) transforms, which include, as special cases, the traditional closed convex polyhedra of Cauchy and the refined closed convex and open convex polyhedra of Alexandrov with total curvature \(2\pi\). By definition, a cap-with-collars consists of an oriented polyhedral cap (considerably generalized from the usual definition of cap) with cylindrical polyhedral collars attached to the boundary. Our definition of a cap requires that its spherical image (by unit normals coherent to the orientation) lie in some hemisphere and that it satisfy a local convexity condition, called edge-convexity, which is weaker than the traditional vertex convexity. The collars are glued to the boundary of the cap so that their faces are parallel to the polar vector of the hemisphere. Caps-with-collars can have great arbitrary Euler characteristic. Among the examples given some are nonconvex; some are surfaces of genus greater than one; some are self-intersecting surfaces; some have branch points and some have pinch points.