Enumerating rigid sphere packings

DOI10.1137/140982337zbMATH Open1346.82045arXiv1407.3285OpenAlexW1608396906MaRDI QIDQ2805266FDOQ2805266

Authors: Miranda Holmes-Cerfon 

Publication date: 10 May 2016

Published in: SIAM Review (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: Packing problems, which ask how to arrange a collection of objects in space to meet certain criteria, are important in a great many physical and biological systems, where geometrical arrangements at small scales control behaviour at larger ones. In many systems there is no single, optimal packing that dominates, but rather one must understand the entire set of possible packings. As a step in this direction we enumerate rigid clusters of identical hard spheres for $nleq14$, and clusters with the maximum number of contacts for $nleq19$. A rigid cluster is one that cannot be continuously deformed while maintaining all contacts. This is a nonlinear notion that arises naturally because such clusters are the metastable states when the spheres interact with a short-range potential, as is the case in many nano- or micro-scale systems. We expect these lists are nearly complete, except for a small number of highly singular clusters (linearly floppy but nonlinearly rigid.) The data contains some major geometrical surprises, such as the prevalence of hypostatic clusters: those with less than the $3n-6$ contacts generically necessary for rigidity. We discuss these and several other unusual clusters, whose geometries may shed insight into physical mechanisms, pose mathematical and computational problems, or bring inspiration for designing new materials.

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/1407.3285

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zbMATH Keywords

nanoparticlesnanostructuresmechanismsrobotscomputational aspects in algebraic geometryrigidity and flexibility of structures

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Kinematics of mechanisms and robots (70B15) Computational aspects in algebraic geometry (14Q99) Rigidity and flexibility of structures (aspects of discrete geometry) (52C25) Statistical mechanics of nanostructures and nanoparticles (82D80) Research exposition (monographs, survey articles) pertaining to mathematics education (97-02)

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Cited In (13)

• Deriving finite sphere packings
• Enumerating rigid sphere packings
• Calculating the symmetry number of flexible sphere clusters
• Enumeration of irreducible contact graphs on the sphere
• Title not available (Why is that?)
• A formula for the number of closest packings of equal spheres having a given repeat period
• On the global minimum of the classical potential energy for clusters bound by many-body forces
• A linear programming algorithm to test for jamming in hard-sphere packings
• Defects and frustration in the packing of soft balls
• Rigidity of packings
• Rigidity of spherical codes
• Bell polynomials and modified Bessel functions of half-integral order
• On contact graphs of totally separable domains

Uses Software

• Bertini
• kepler98

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