An example of a convex body without symmetric projections (Q5951493)

The asymptotic theory of finite dimensional normed spaces studies the behaviour of symmetric convex bodies in \({\mathbb R}^n\) as the dimension grows to infinity. One of the current trends of the theory is to prove analogues of results of the theory for non-symmetric convex bodies. It turns out that many results of the theory remain valid in the non-symmetric case. In this connection a number of authors conjectured that for every convex body \(K\) in \({\mathbb R}^n\) there exists an orthogonal projection \(P\) of rank \(k\), proportional to \(n\), such that \(P(K)\) is almost symmetric. If this conjecture would be true, many of the results would be automatically generalized from the symmetric case to the non-symmetric one. The main purpose of the paper is to construct a counterexample to the conjecture. The construction uses the method introduced by \textit{E. D. Gluskin} [Funct. Anal. Appl. 15, 57-58 (1981; Zbl 0469.46017)]. Another source of intuition for the construction of this paper is the result of \textit{A. Litvak} and \textit{N. Tomczak-Jaegermann} [Lect. Notes Math. 1745, 169-190 (2000; Zbl 0986.52003)] showing that a random projection of the regular simplex is very far from being symmetric.