Magnitude, diversity, capacities, and dimensions of metric spaces (Q2256556)

The author defines weighting and magnitude as in [\textit{T. Leinster}, Doc. Math., J. DMV 18, 857--905 (2013; Zbl 1284.51011)]. Let \(A\) be a finite metric space. The similarity matrix \(\zeta_A \in \mathbb{R}^{A\times A} \) is defined by \(\zeta_A(a,b)=e^{-d(a,b)} \, (a,b \in A).\) A weighting on \(A\) is a function \(w:A\rightarrow \mathbb{R}\) such that \(\sum_b \zeta_A(a,b) w(b) =1\) for all \(a\in A.\) The space \(A\) has magnitude if it admits at least one weighting; its magnitude is then \(|A|=\sum_a w(a)\) for any weighting \(w\), and is independent of the weighting chosen. For a metric space \(A=(A,d)\), put \(tA=(A,td)\) for \(t>0\). The function \(t\rightarrow |tA|\) is called the magnitude function. The author points out that the magnitude has an interpretation in biology. In [\textit{A. R. Solow} and \textit{S. Polasky}, ``Measuring biological diversity'', J. Environ. Ecol. Stat. 1, 95--107 (1994)], the magnitude is called the ``effective number of species'' in an ecosystem. The author investigates a large variety of topics. Among them are properties of positive definite metric spaces; the magnitude for a compact metric space \(A\); the potential function of \(A\); the maximum diversity of \(A\); the magnitude in a Euclidean space; the upper magnitude dimension and eventually the Minkowski dimenson of a compact metric space \(A\).