Hyper-atoms applied to the critical pair theory (Q2300159)

The sumset of two subsets \(A\) and \(B\) of an abelian group \(G\), is \(A+B=\{a+b \ | \ a\in A, b \in B \}.\) If \(A+B\) is aperiodic (that is the set has a trivial stabilizer), then it is known that \(|A+B| \geq |A|+|B| -1.\) \textit{J. H. B. Kemperman}'s theorem [Acta Math. 103, 63--88 (1960; Zbl 0108.25704)] describes the sets \(A\) and \(B\) for which \(|A+B| \leq |A|+|B| -1.\) Let \(\kappa_1(S) = \min \{ |X+S|-|S| \ | \ X\) is a finite subset of the group \(G\) with at least \(k\) elements satisfying \(|G \backslash (X+S)| \geq k \}.\) A maximal cardinality subgroup with \(\kappa_1(S) = |H+S| - |H|\) is a hyper-atom. The authors uses hyper-atoms to give a new isoperimetric proof of the Kemperman structure theorem which overcomes a previous weakness.