Polyhedra inscribed in a quadric (Q2187257)

A convex polyhedron \(P\) is inscribed in the surface \(S\) if \(P \cap S\) is exactly the set of vertices of \(P\). Steinitz showed that a graph \(\Gamma\) is the 1-skeleton of a convex polyhedron in \(\mathbb{R}^3\) if and only if \(\Gamma\) is planar and 3-connected. Steinitz also found a 3-connected planar graph which is not realized as the 1-skeleton of any polyhedron inscribed in the unit sphere \(\mathbb{S}\). \textit{C. D. Hodgson} et al. [Bull. Am. Math. Soc., New Ser. 27, No. 2, 246--251 (1992; Zbl 0759.52010)] completely characterized which polytope types can or cannot be inscribed in a sphere. This article extends this line of work and studies realizability by polyhedra inscribed in other quadric surfaces in \(\mathbb{R}^3\), i.e., hyperboloid and the cylinder, upto projective transformations. In this article, the authors prove the equivalence of when a planar graph \(\Gamma\) is the 1-skeleton of some convex polyhedron inscribed in the cylinder, hyperboloid and sphere. Their main result is the following: Theorem. Let \(\Gamma\) be a planar graph. Then the following conditions are equivalent: \begin{itemize} \item[(C)] \(\Gamma\) is the 1-skeleton of some convex polyhedron inscribed in the cylinder. \item[(H)] \(\Gamma\) is the 1-skeleton of some convex polyhedron inscribed in the hyperboloid. \item[(S)] \(\Gamma\) is the 1-skeleton of some convex polyhedron inscribed in the sphere and \(\Gamma\) admits a Hamiltonian cycle. \end{itemize} A convex polyhedron inscribed in the sphere is associated to a convex ideal polyhedron in the hyperbolic space \(\mathbb{H}^3\); as in an appropriate affine chart, \(\mathbb{H}^3\) is an unit ball with the sphere describing the projective boundary. Similarly, a convex polyhedron inscribed in the hyperboloid is naturally associated to a convex ideal polyhedron in the anti-de Sitter space. And a convex polyhedron inscribed in the cylinder is naturally associated to a convex ideal polyhedron in the half-pipe space. Rivin parameterized the deformation space of such ideal polyhedra in \(\mathbb{H}^3\) in terms of dihedral angles. Hodgson et al. [loc. cit.] showed that deciding whether a planar graph \(\Gamma\) may be realized as the 1-skeleton of a polyhedron inscribed in the sphere amounts to solving a linear programming problem on \(\Gamma\). To prove the above theorem, the authors give a similar linear programming problem whose solutions determine polyhedra inscribed in either the cylinder or the hyperboloid. In the process, the authors also prove a number of fundamental theorems on hyperbolic, anti-de Sitter, and half-pipe geometry in dimension 3.