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Aarhus Universitets segl

Large parallel volumes of finite and compact sets in d-dimensional Euclidean space

by Jürgen Kampf and Markus Kiderlen
CSGB Research Reports Number 8 (December 2011)

The r-parallel volume V(Cr) of a compact subset C in d-dimensional Euclidean space is the volume of the set Cr of all points of Euclidean distance at most r>0 from C. According to Steiner's formula, V(Cr) is a polynomial in r when C is convex. For finite sets C satisfying a certain geometric condition, a Laurent expansion of V(Cr) for large r is obtained. The dependence of the coefficients on the geometry of C is explicitly given by so-called intrinsic power volumes of C. In the planar case such an expansion holds for all finite sets C. Finally, when C is a compact set in arbitrary dimension, it is shown that the difference of large r-parallel volumes of C and of its convex hull behaves like crd3, where c is an intrinsic power volume of C.

Keywords: Large parallel sets, Laurent expansion of parallel volume, Steiner formula, intrinsic power volume.

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