Minkowski arrangements of spheres (Q1424404)

Let \(0<\mu\leqslant 1\). Consider an arrangement \(\mathcal S\) of (not necessary congruent) spheres with positive homogenity in~\({\mathbb R}^n\); i.e., in which the infimum of radii of spheres divided by the supremum of radii is a positive number. With each sphere \(S\in {\mathcal S}\) a concentric sphere (the \(\mu\)-kernel) of radius \(\mu \) times the radius of~\(S\) is associated. The arrangement \({\mathcal S}\) is said to be Minkowski arrangement of order~\(\mu\) if no sphere of~\({\mathcal S}\) overlaps the \(\mu\)-kernel of another sphere. The authors find the upper bound for the greatest possible density \(d_n(\mu)\) of \(n\)-dimensional Minkowski sphere arrangements of order~\(\mu\) in cases \(\mu \leqslant 1/n\). Namely, let \(n\geqslant 2\), \(\mu \leqslant 1/n\). Then \(d_n(\mu)\leqslant (2^n\sigma _n)/(1+\mu)^n\), where \(\sigma_n=\frac {\text{vol}(\Sigma\cap (\cup S(v_i,1)))} {\text{vol}(\Sigma)}\), \(\Sigma\) is a simplex of length~\(2\) with vertices \(v_i\), \(S(v_i,1)\) is a sphere of radius~\(1\) with centre~\(v_i\).