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Gruber P. Convex and Discrete Geometry

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Fig. 9.4. Isospectral membranes<br />

9 Symmetrization 185<br />

Weyl [1019] showed that the area of a plane membrane is determined by the sequence<br />

of its principal frequencies. This led to the speculation that, perhaps, the shape is also<br />

determined by this sequence. Quite unexpectedly, Gordon, Webb <strong>and</strong> Wolpert [388]<br />

constructed examples of essentially distinct non-convex isospectral membranes (see<br />

Fig. 9.4), i.e. membranes with the same sequence of principal frequencies. In other<br />

words, one cannot hear the shape of a drum. See also the article of Buser, Conway,<br />

Doyle <strong>and</strong> Semmler [185]. The figure shows a pair of isospectral membranes specified<br />

by McDonald <strong>and</strong> Meyers [703].<br />

9.5 Central Symmetrization <strong>and</strong> the Rogers–Shephard Inequality<br />

Given a convex body C, there are several possibilities to assign to C a convex body<br />

which is centrally symmetric with respect to some point. Here the following possibility<br />

will be considered: The difference body D of C, defined by<br />

D = C − C ={x − y : x, y ∈ C},<br />

is convex <strong>and</strong> symmetric with respect to o. The convex body 1 2 D is called the central<br />

symmetral of C.<br />

The difference body is important for, e.g. the isodiametric inequality, for packing<br />

<strong>and</strong> tiling. See Sects. 8.3, 30 <strong>and</strong> 32.2. In this section, we give tight lower <strong>and</strong> upper<br />

estimates for the volume of the difference body of a given convex body in terms of the<br />

volume of the original body. The lower estimate is an immediate consequence of the<br />

Brunn–Minkowski inequality. The upper estimate is the Rogers–Shephard inequality<br />

[852]. For applications of this inequality to density estimates for lattice <strong>and</strong> nonlattice<br />

packing, see Sects. 30.1 <strong>and</strong> 30.3. A simple proof of a more general result is<br />

due to Chakerian [199].<br />

Estimates for V(C − C)<br />

Our aim is to show the inequality of Rogers <strong>and</strong> Shephard without considering the<br />

equality cases. This is the right-h<strong>and</strong> inequality in the following result.

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