Families of faces and the normal cycle of a convex semi-algebraic set (Q6132681)

In this paper, the authors study the boundary of convex semi-algebraic sets. Specifically, they study the faces in the boundary. At the core of their results are the normal cycle of a convex set and of a convex cone. These concepts are introduced at the beginning of Section 2. Remark 2.2 points out that the normal cycle of a convex set \(K\) and the normal cycle of its homogenization \(\widehat{K}\) (which is a cone) are semi-algebraically homeomorphic. After this remark, most of the results about normal cycles are proved for proper convex cones \(C\). In the reminder of Section 2, the authors prove that the normal cycle of a proper cone is self dual (Lemma 2.3), and that the normal cycle of a compact convex set \(K\) containing the origin in its interior is a compact semi-algebraic set of pure dimension (Theorem 2.7). In Section 3, they use the conormal variety of a projective algebraic variety, and its biregular locus, to define the primal patch, closed primal patch, and dual patch of an irreducible component of the algebraic boundary of a proper cone \(C\). Then they provide multiple examples to illustrate all these definitions. These examples not only clarify all the concepts for the new reader, but also highlight the importance of all the conditions in the definitions. The main result of this section is Theorem 3.16. In this theorem they consider an irreducible component of the algebric boundary of a proper cone in \(\mathbb{R}^{n-1}\), and a patch \(P\) over this component. They show that \(P\) is of pure projective dimension \(n-1\), and find Zariski dense sets of the faces of some linear section of the cone. These linear sections are associated to \(P\). The main consequence of this theorem is that the family of patches of the algebraic boundary of a cone can be theoretically computed. Some remarks about these computations are the subject of Section 4. In Section 4, the focus turns to the computational aspects of the family of patches of the algebraic boundary of a cone. They obtain a description of these patches via sampling of a variety that depends on the conormal variety of the algebraic boundary of the cone \(C\). Finally, Section 5 is a short section dedicated to Hyperbolicity cones where the family of patches can be studied in more precise detail.