Regular spatial heptagons based on symmetry
Consider a closed polygonal line \(H\) made of seven line segments and contained in the \(3\)-dimensional Euclidean space. Under the assumption that these seven segments have the same length and the seven pairs of consecutive segments form the same angle \(\alpha\), \(H\) is called a \textit{regular heptagon}. Note that \(H\) is not necessarily embedded in the sense that the segments it is made of are allowed to intersect and more than two of them may share a vertex (such a vertex is called a \textit{double vertex}). A regular heptagon can be continuously deformed in such a way that all the polygonal lines obtained along that transformation remain regular heptagons. In particular, one can ask whether the configuration space of regular heptagons is connected. In this article, \begin{itemize} \item[(i)] the set of all regular heptagons that are symmetric with respect to a plane is explicitly described and shown to be made of two connected components each of which is parametrized by a continuous variable and a binary variable and \item[(ii)] the set of all regular heptagons with at least one double vertex such that \(\alpha\) is equal to \(\pi/3\) is also explicitly described. \end{itemize} It is conjectured that all regular heptagons such that \(\alpha\) is equal to \(\pi/3\) have a double vertex [\textit{B. J. Cox}, Z. Angew. Math. Phys. 67, No. 3, Article ID 52, 17 p. (2016; Zbl 1349.92165)]. Under this conjecture, (ii) implies that the set of all regular heptagons such that \(\alpha\) is equal to \(\pi/3\) is also connected. Numerical evidence is further provided that the set of all regular heptagons that are symmetric with respect to a line and the set of all regular heptagons with a fixed \(\alpha\) (no necessarily equal to \(\pi/3\)) are connected. Proving these two statements would show that the configuration space of all regular hexagons is connected.
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