A moving object and an observer in a Banach space (Q542356)

Let \(X\) be a Banach space with differentiable strictly convex norm \(\|\cdot\|,\, G\subset X\) be the closure of an open subset of \(X\), \(t\in X\setminus G\), a moving object, and \(f\in X\) an observer. The object \(t\) is visible for \(f\) if \((t,f)\cap G=\emptyset\), where \((t,f)=\{(1-\theta)t+\theta f : 0<\theta<1\}\) denotes the open segment with endpoints \(t\) and \(f\). One supposes that the location of \(f\) is known with an error \(h>0\), i.e., it is known that it belongs to the open ball \(V'_h(f)=\{x\in X : \|f-x\|'<h\}\), where \(\|\cdot\|'\) is a differentiable norm on \(X,\) possibly different from \(\|\cdot\|\). The observer prefers a position such that any point of the ball \(V_r(t)=\{x\in X : \|t-x\|<r\}\) is visible for \(f\) for a number \(r>0\) as large as possible. Putting \(K_r(t,f,h)=\operatorname{conv}\left(V_r(t)\cup V'_h(f)\right)\setminus V'_h(f)\), this means that \(K_r(t,f,h)\cap G=\emptyset\) for the largest \(r\), and so the function \(r(t,f)=r_h(t,f,G)=\min\{r>0 : K_r(t,f,h)\cap G\neq\emptyset\}\) characterizes the visibility of \(t\) for \(f\). The paper is concerned with the differentiability properties of the function \(r\). To this end, one considers the function \(R(t,f,g)=\min\{r>0 : g\in K_r(t,f,h)\}\), so that \(r(t,f)=r(t,f,G)=\min\{R(t,f,g) : g\in G\}\). By studying the differentiability properties of the function \(R\), the author concludes that if the Banach space \(X\) is smooth, strictly convex and finite-dimensional, then the function \(r(t,f,g)\) is differentiable in any direction \(u\) with \(\|u\|=1\), and \(\partial_u r(t,f,G) =\min\{\partial_u R(t,f,g) : g\in G(t)\}\), where \(G(t)=\{g\in G : R(t,f,g)=r(t,f,G)\) and \(\partial_u H(t,f,g)\) denotes the derivative with respect to \(t\) in the direction \(u\) of a function \(H\). The results of this paper extend those obtained by the author in the case of the space \(X=\mathbb R^3\) equipped with the Euclidean norm, see [Dokl. Math. 79, No.~3, 94--96 (2009); translation from Dokl. Akad. Nauk., Ross. Akad. Nauk. 424, No.~5, 588--590 (2009)]. An extended version is published in [``Object visibility for an observer with inaccurately given coordinates'' (in Russian), Tr. Inst. Mat. Mekh. (Ekaterinburg) 15, No.~3, 21--28 (2009), \url{http://mi.mathnet.ru/eng/timm403}].