Bounding the number of \(k\)-faces in arrangements of hyperplanes (Q1175787)

An arrangement of hyperplanes is a collection of \(n\) hyperplanes in the \(d\)-dimensional Euclidean space \(\mathbb{R}^ d\), together with the naturally associated cell decomposition of \(\mathbb{R}^ d\). A \(k\)-dimensional cell of the arrangement, which is a relatively open connected region, is called a \(k\)-face. An arrangement is called simple if the intersection of any \(m\) hyperplanes \((m\leq d+1)\) has exactly dimension \(d-m\). The sequence \((f_ k)_{k=0,1,\dots d}\) of the numbers of \(k\)-dimensional faces of an arrangement is called the \(f\)-vector. The \(h\)-vector of an arrangement is the sequence \((h_ 0,h_ 1,\dots,h_ n)\) where \(h_ i=\sum^ i_{j=0}\left({d-j\atop d-i}\right)(-1)^{i-j}f_ j\) \((0\leq i\leq d)\). A sequence of real numbers \((v_ 0,v_ 1,\dots,v_ m)\) is said to be logarithmic concave if \(v^ 2_ i\geq v_{i-1}v_{i+1}\) for all \(1\leq i\leq m-1\). The first result is that the mean number of \((k-1)\)-faces lying on the boundary of a fixed \(k\)-face is less than \(2k\) in any arrangement, which implies the simple linear inequality \(f_ k>[(d-k+1)/k]f_{k-1}\) if \(f_ k\neq 0\). Similar results hold for spherical arrangements and for oriented matroids. The authors also show that the \(f\)-vector and the \(h\)-vector of a simple arrangement is logarithmic concave.