A convexity theorem for real projective structures (Q292043)

Give an open connected subset \(\Omega\) in \(\mathbb{R}^n\) with a tessellation by convex polytopes, one could ask what conditions on the tessellation would guarantee the convexity of \(\Omega\). The author studies the condition which makes the tessellation \textit{residually convex}. Introduced by M. Kapovich in the plane, such a tessellation is one in which the union of any two adjacent polygons sharing a common edge is convex. To generalize certain results from planar domains to higher dimension, the author introduces two new notions of polytopes: triangular and, respectively, a polytope whose dual is a \textit{thick} polytope. These new notions are analogues of triangles and polygons with at least five edges. One should note that the author proves in fact his results for a larger class of real projective structures. Given a finite collection of convex polytopes in \(\mathbb{R}P^n\), \(n \geq 2\), let \(M\) be a real projective manifold which is obtained by gluing together the polytopes of the collection along their facets such that the union of any two adjacent polytope sharing a face is convex. The main result states that \(M\) is convex if the collection of polytopes contains no triangular polytope; and is properly convex if, additionally, the collection of polytopes contains a polytope whose dual is thick.