In this paper, we deal with a simple geometric problem: Is it possible to partition a rectangle into $k$ non-congruent rectangles of equal area? This problem is motivated by the so-called `Mondrian art problem' that asks a similar question for dissections with rectangles of integer sides. Here, we generalize the Mondrian problem by allowing rectangles of real sides. In this case, we show that the minimum value of $k$ for a rectangle to have a `perfect Mondrian partition' (that is, with non-congruent equal-area rectangles) is seven. Moreover, we prove that such a partition is unique (up to symmetries) and that there exist exactly two proper perfect Mondrian partitions for $k=8$. Finally, we also prove that any square has a perfect Mondrian decomposition for $k\ge 7$.
Let a polygon be composed of equal rectangles. We find all quadratic irrationals r for which the polygon can be tiled by similar rectangles with given side ratio r.
In this paper we give a classification of tilings of the sphere by congruent quadrilaterals with exactly two equal edges. The tilings are the earth map tilings, $(p,q)$-earth map tilings and their flip modifications, and quadrilateral subdivisions of the cube and the triangular prism. We described the ranges of values of the edges and angles for the tile to be geometrically realisable. The symmetry groups of the tilings are also determined.
We prove that one can cover the $1 \times b$ rectangle by equal squares on both sides in one layer iff $b = p \pm \sqrt{p^2 - r^2} $, where $p \ge r \ge 0$ and $p,q \in \mathbb{Q}$.
The Mondrian problem consists of dissecting a square of side length $n\in \NN$ into non-congruent rectangles with natural length sides such that the difference $d(n)$ between the largest and the smallest areas of the rectangles partitioning the square is minimum. In this paper, we compute some bounds on $d(n)$ in terms of the number of rectangles of the square partition. These bounds provide us optimal partitions for some values of $n \in \NN$. We provide a sequence of square partitions such that $d(n)/n^2$ tends to zero for $n$ large enough. For the case of `perfect' partitions, that is, with…
A $Γ$-magic rectangle set $MRS_Γ(a, b; c)$ of order $abc$ is a collection of $c$ arrays $(a\times b)$ whose entries are elements of group $Γ$, each appearing once, with all row sums in every rectangle equal to a constant $ω\in Γ$ and all column sums in every rectangle equal to a constant $δ\in Γ$. In this paper we prove that for $\{a,b\}\neq\{2^α,2k+1\}$ where $α$ and $k$ are some natural numbers, a $Γ$-magic rectangle set MRS$_Γ(a, b;c)$ exists if and only if $a$ and $b$ are both even or and $|Γ|$ is odd or $Γ$ has more than one involution. Moreover we obtain sufficient and necessary conditio…
We discuss a new companion to Capparelli's identities. Capparelli's identities for m=1,2 state that the number of partitions of $n$ into distinct parts not congruent to m, -m modulo $6$ is equal to the number of partitions of n into distinct parts not equal to m, where the difference between parts is greater than or equal to 4, unless consecutive parts are either both consecutive multiples of 3 or add up to to a multiple of 6. In this paper we show that the set of partitions of n into distinct parts where the odd-indexed parts are not congruent to m modulo 3, the even-indexed parts are not con…
Shikaku is a pencil puzzle consisting of a rectangular grid, with some cells containing a number. The player has to partition the grid into rectangles such that each rectangle contains exactly one number equal to the area of that rectangle. In this paper, we propose two physical zero-knowledge proof protocols for Shikaku using a deck of playing cards, which allow a prover to physically show that he/she knows a solution of the puzzle without revealing it. Most importantly, in our second protocol we develop a general technique to physically verify a rectangle-shaped area with a certain size in a…
A survey of enumeration problems arising from the study of graphs formed when the edges of a polygon are marked with evenly spaced points and every pair of points is joined by a line. A few of these problems have been solved, a classical example being the the graph K_n formed when all pairs of vertices of a regular n-gon are joined by chords, which was analyzed by Poonen and Rubinstein in 1998. Most of these problems are unsolved, however, and this two-part article provides data from a number of such problems as well as colored illustrations, which are often reminiscent of stained glass window…
Let $\mathcal O_r(n)$ be the set of $r$-regular partitions of $n$, $\mathcal D_r(n)$ the set of partitions of $n$ with parts repeated at most $r-1$ times, $\mathcal O_{1,r}(n)$ the set of partitions with exactly one part (possibly repeated) divisible by $r$, and let $\mathcal D_{1,r}(n)$ be the set of partitions in which exactly one part appears at least $r$ times. If $E_{r, t}(n)$ is the excess in the number of parts congruent to $t \pmod r$ in all partitions in $\mathcal O_r(n)$ over the number of different parts appearing at least $t$ times in all partitions in $\mathcal D_r(n)$, then $E_{r…
Moser asked whether the collection of rectangles of dimensions 1 x 1/2, 1/2 x 1/3, 1/3 x 1/4, ..., whose total area equals 1, can be packed into the unit square without overlap, and whether the collection of squares of side lengths 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, ... can be packed without overlap into a rectangle of area pi^2/6-1. Computational investigations have been made into packing these collections into squares of side length 1+epsilon and rectangles of area pi^2/6-1+epsilon, respectively, and one can consider the apparently weaker question whether such packings are possible for every positive number eps…
Schur's partition theorem states that the number of partitions of n into distinct parts congruent 1, 2 (mod 3) equals the number of partitions of n into parts which differ by >= 3, where the inequality is strict if a part is a multiple of 3. We establish a double bounded refined version of this theorem by imposing one bound on the parts congruent 0,1 (mod 3) and another on the parts congruent 2 (mod 3), and by keeping track of the number of parts in each of the residue classes (mod 3). Despite the long history of Schur's theorem, our result is new, and extends earlier work of Andrews, Alladi-G…
A Not-All-Equal (NAE) decomposition of a graph $G$ is a decomposition of the vertices of $G$ into two parts such that each vertex in $G$ has at least one neighbor in each part. Also, a 1-in-Degree decomposition of a graph $G$ is a decomposition of the vertices of $G$ into two parts $A$ and $B$ such that each vertex in the graph $G$ has exactly one neighbor in part $A$. Among our results, we show that for a given graph $G$, if $G$ does not have any cycle of length congruent to 2 mod 4, then there is a polynomial time algorithm to decide whether $G$ has a 1-in-Degree decomposition. In sharp cont…
