Average section functions for star-shaped sets (Q2490033)

Recall that a star-body in Euclidean \(d\)-space \(E^d\) is a compact set which is star-shaped with respect to the origin, contains the origin as an interior point, and has continuous radial function. Let \(K \subset E^d\) be a star body and let \(2 \leq j \leq d-1\). The paper introduces the average \(s_j(K,u)\) of the intersection volume over all \(j\)-dimensional half-spaces \(H\) containing a given direction \(u\) which is orthogonal to the boundary of \(H\). The authors put the question whether the resulting function \(s_j(K, \cdot)\) on the unit sphere \(S^{d-1}\) determines \(K\) uniquely. They show the uniqueness in the case \(j=2\) for \(d \in \{3, 4 \}\), and in the cases \(j \leq (d+2)/2\) and \(j > (2d+1)/3\) for \(d \geq 5\). They also show infinitely many pairs of the integers \(j\) and \(d\) for which uniqueness fails.