Shortest paths on cubes

DOI10.1080/07468342.2021.1866944MaRDI QIDQ4956268zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors Richard Goldstone, Rachel Roca, Robert Suzzi Valli

Publication date 1 September 2021

Published in The College Mathematics Journal (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.06096

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Combinatorial properties of polytopes and polyhedra (number of faces, shortest paths, etc.) (52B05) Geodesics in global differential geometry (53C22) Plane and solid geometry (educational aspects) (97G40)

Abstract: In 1903, noted puzzle-maker Henry Dudeney published The Spider and the Fly puzzle, which asks for the shortest path along the surfaces of a square prism between two points (source and target) located on the square faces, and surprisingly showed that the shortest path traverses five faces. Dudeney's source and target points had very symmetrical locations; in this article, we allow the source and target points to be anywhere in the interior of opposite faces, but now require the square prism to be a cube. In this context, we find that, depending on source and target locations, a shortest path can traverse either three or four faces, and we investigate the conditions that lead to four-face solutions and estimate the probability of getting a four-face shortest path. We utilize a combination of numerical calculations, elementary geometry, and transformations we call corner moves of cube unfolding diagrams,

Recommendations

• On Shortest Paths in Polyhedral Spaces
• The Number of Shortest Paths on the Surface of a Polyhedron
• SHORTEST PATHS ON A POLYHEDRON, Part I: COMPUTING SHORTEST PATHS
• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 3907791
• On optimal route planning evading cubes in the three space

Cites work

• A Trajectory from a Vertex to Itself on the Dodecahedron
• Closed geodesics on regular polyhedra
• Geodesics on regular polyhedra with endpoints at the vertices
• Geodesics on the regular tetrahedron and the cube
• Periodic billiard trajectories in regular polygons and closed geodesics on regular polyhedra
• Unfoldings of the cube

Cited in

(1)

• Distance and Short Parallel Paths in Augmented Cubes

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