A baker's dozen of problems (Q2356482)
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English | A baker's dozen of problems |
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A baker's dozen of problems (English)
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29 July 2015
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The title of the paper says it all: This is a collection of various mathematical problems. In every one of the 13 sections (a baker's dozen), the author presents a problem or a conjecture that is basically unsolved and up for grabs. The intriguing thing about it is that the problems are from very different swathes of mathematics. The first five sections are dedicated to different kinds of billiard problems. Next, some converse Desargues theorem is stated. Further on, the existence of chains of null geodesics on an ellipsoid in Minkowski space is examined. The basic unicycle problem, though surprising, is widely solved. The respective conjectures posed there are still interesting add-ons. On and off, the author himself delivers elaborate answers to some of the stated questions and problems. Section 11 is on new configuration problems in projective geometry. The existence of particular configurations can be hard to prove. In that particular case, the author et al. could find a proof but only by `brute force computer computation'. Last, but not least, the author addresses the problem of dissections of areas into triangles. The starting point of this last topic is the theorem that any dissection of a square with triangles of equal areas must consist of an even number of triangles. This theorem, though proved by Stein and Szabo as early as in 1994, is the inspiration for a number of further questions and challenges.
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inner and outer billiards
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Desargues theorem
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porism and Cayley criterion
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origami
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projective duality
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bicycle tracks
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equip-areal triangulation
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