Apollonian Circle Packings: Geometry and Group Theory I. The Apollonian Group
R. L. Graham, J. C. Lagarias, C. L. Mallows, A. R. Wilks, C. H. Yan
备注：
42 pages, 11 figures. Extensively revised version on June 14, 2004. Revised Appendix B and a few changes on July, 2004. Slight revision on March 10, 2005
发表信息：
Discrete and Computational Geometry, 34: 547-585(2005)
Apollonian circle packings arise by repeatedly filling the interstices between four mutually tangent circles with further tangent circles. We observe that there exist Apollonian packings which have strong integrality properties, in which all circles in the packing have integer curvatures and rational centers such that (curvature)$\times$(center) is an integer vector. This series of papers explain such properties. A {\em Descartes configuration} is a set of four mutually tangent circles with disjoint interiors. We describe the space of all Descartes configurations using a coordinate system $\sM_\DD$ consisting of those $4 \times 4$ real matrices $\bW$ with $\bW^T \bQ_{D} \bW = \bQ_{W}$ where $\bQ_D$ is the matrix of the Descartes quadratic form $Q_D= x_1^2 + x_2^2+ x_3^2 + x_4^2 -{1/2}(x_1 +x_2 +x_3 + x_4)^2$ and $\bQ_W$ of the quadratic form $Q_W = -8x_1x_2 + 2x_3^2 + 2x_4^2$. There are natural group actions on the parameter space $\sM_\DD$. We observe that the Descartes configurations in each Apollonian packing form an orbit under a certain finitely generated discrete group, the {\em Apollonian group}. This group consists of $4 \times 4$ integer matrices, and its integrality properties lead to the integrality properties observed in some Apollonian circle packings. We introduce two more related finitely generated groups, the dual Apollonian group and the super-Apollonian group, which have nice geometrically interpretations. We show these groups are hyperbolic Coxeter groups.
Apollonian circle packings arise by repeatedly filling the interstices between four mutually tangent circles with further tangent circles. Such packings can be described in terms of the Descartes configurations they contain. It observed there exist infinitely many types of integral Apollonian packings in which all circles had integer curvatures, with the integral structure being related to the integral nature of the Apollonian group. Here we consider the action of a larger discrete group, the super-Apollonian group, also having an integral structure, whose orbits describe the Descartes quadrup…
We introduce an orthoplicial Apollonian sphere packing, which is a sphere packing obtained by successively inverting a configuration of 8 spheres with 4-orthplicial tangency graph. We will show that there are such packings in which the bends of all constituent spheres are integral, and establish the asymptotic local-global principle for the set of bends in these packings.
We study the orbit of $\widehat{\mathbb{R}}$ under the Möbius action of the Bianchi group $\operatorname{PSL}_2(\mathcal{O}_K)$ on $\widehat{\mathbb{C}}$, where $\mathcal{O}_K$ is the ring of integers of an imaginary quadratic field $K$. The orbit $\mathcal{S}_K$, called a Schmidt arrangement, is a geometric realisation, as an intricate circle packing, of the arithmetic of $K$. We give a simple geometric characterisation of certain subsets of $\mathcal{S}_K$ generalizing Apollonian circle packings, and show that $\mathcal{S}_K$, considered with orientations, is a disjoint union of all primitiv…
We consider Apollonian circle packings of a half Euclidean plane. We give necessary and sufficient conditions for two such packings to be related by a Euclidean similarity (that is, by translations, reflections, rotations and dilations) and describe explicitly the group of self-similarities of a given packing. We observe that packings with a non-trivial self-similarity correspond to positive real numbers that are the roots of quadratic polynomials with rational coefficients. This is reflected in a close connection between Apollonian circle packings and continued fractions which allows us to co…
The curvatures of the circles in integral Apollonian circle packings, named for Apollonius of Perga (262-190 BC), form an infinite collection of integers whose Diophantine properties have recently seen a surge in interest. Here, we give a new description of Apollonian circle packings built upon the study of the collection of bases of Z[i]^2, inspired by, and intimately related to, the `sensual quadratic form' of Conway.
In an earlier work, we proposed a generalization for the Apollonian packing in arbitrary dimensions and showed that the resulting object in four, five, and six dimensions have properties consistent with the Apollonian circle and sphere packings in two and three dimensions. In this work, we investigate the generalization in seven and eight dimensions and show that they too have many of the properties of those in lower dimensions. In particular, the hyperspheres are tangent or do not intersect; they fill the hyperspace; the object includes a maximal cluster of mutually tangent hyperspheres; and …
This paper gives $n$-dimensional analogues of the Apollonian circle packings in parts I and II. We work in the space $\sM_{\dd}^n$ of all $n$-dimensional oriented Descartes configurations parametrized in a coordinate system, ACC-coordinates, as those $(n+2) \times (n+2)$ real matrices $\bW$ with $\bW^T \bQ_{D,n} \bW = \bQ_{W,n}$ where $Q_{D,n} = x_1^2 +... + x_{n+2}^2 - \frac{1}{n}(x_1 +... + x_{n+2})^2$ is the $n$-dimensional Descartes quadratic form, $Q_{W,n} = -8x_1x_2 + 2x_3^2 + ... + 2x_{n+2}^2$, and $\bQ_{D,n}$ and $\bQ_{W,n}$ are their corresponding symmetric matrices. There are natural…
We extend fundamental results concerning Apollonian packings, which constitute a major object of study in number theory, to certain homogeneous sets that arise naturally in complex dynamics and geometric group theory. In particular, we give an analogue of D. W. Boyd's theorem (relating the curvature distribution function of an Apollonian packing to its exponent and the Hausdorff dimension of the residual set) for Sierpiński carpets that are Julia sets of hyperbolic rational maps.
A construction and algebraic characterization of two unbounded Apollonian Disk packings in the plane and the half-plane are presented. Both turn out to involve the golden ratio.
A parametrization of integral Descartes configurations (and effectively Apollonian disk packings) by pairs of two-dimensional integral vectors is presented. The vectors, called here tangency spinors defined for pairs of tangent disks, are spinors associated to the Clifford algebra for three-dimensional Minkowski space. A version with Pauli spinors is given. The construction provides a novel interpretation to the known Diophantine equation parametrizing integral Apollonian packings.
We investigate in this paper the relation between Apollonian $d$-ball packings and stacked $(d+1)$-polytopes for dimension $d\ge 3$. For $d=3$, the relation is fully described: we prove that the $1$-skeleton of a stacked $4$-polytope is the tangency graph of an Apollonian $3$-ball packing if and only if no six $4$-cliques share a $3$-clique. For higher dimension, we have some partial results.
We introduce an analog of Bianchi groups for rational quaternion algebras and use it to construct sphere packings that are analogs of the Apollonian circle packing known as integral crystallographic packings.
Apollonian gaskets are formed by repeatedly filling the gaps between three mutually tangent circles with further tangent circles. In this paper we give explicit formulas for the the limiting pair correlation and the limiting nearest neighbor spacing of centers of circles from a fixed Apollonian gasket. These are corollaries of the convergence of moments that we prove. The input from ergodic theory is an extension of Mohammadi-Oh's Theorem on the equidisribution of expanding horospheres in infinite volume hyperbolic spaces.
The goal of this paper is to study two basic problems of hyperbolic geometry. The first problem is to compare the hyperbolic and Euclidean distances. The second problem is to find hyperbolic counterparts of some basic geometric constructions such as the construction of the middle point of a hyperbolic geodesic segment. Apollonian circles have a key role in this study.
The depth function of three numbers representing curvatures of three mutually tangent circles is introduced. Its 2D plot leads to a partition of the moduli space of the triples of mutually tangent circles/disks that is unexpectedly a beautiful fractal, the general form of which resembles that of an Apollonian disk packing, except that it consists of ellipses instead of circles.
Apollonian gaskets are formed by repeatedly filling the interstices between four mutually tangent circles with further tangent circles. We experimentally study the pair correlation, electrostatic energy, and nearest neighbor spacing of centers of circles from Apollonian gaskets. Even though the centers of these circles are not uniformly distributed in any `ambient' space, after proper normalization, all these statistics seem to exhibit some interesting limiting behaviors.
We find a formula for the area of disks tangent to a given disk in an Apollonian disk packing (corona) in terms of a certain novel arithmetic Zeta function. The idea is based on "tangency spinors" defined for pairs of tangent disks.
Fix two points $p$ and $q$ in the plane and a positive number $k \neq 1$. A result credited to Apollonius of Perga states that the set of points $x$ that satisfy $d(x, p)/d(x, q) = k$ forms a circle. In this paper we study the analogous set in taxicab geometry. We find that while Apollonian sets are not taxicab circles, more complicated Apollonian sets can be characterized in terms of simpler ones.
We define spinors for pairs of tangent disks in the Euclidean plane and prove a number of theorems, one of which may be interpreted as a "square root of Descartes Theorem". In any Apollonian disk packing, spinors form a network. In the Apollonian Window, a special case of Apollonian disk packing, all spinors are integral.
In this note, we investigate an infinite one parameter family of circle packings, each with a set of three mutually tangent circles. We use these to generate an infinite set of circle packings with the Apollonian property. That is, every circle in the packing is a member of a cluster of four mutually tangent circles.
We consider families of confocal conics and two pencils of Apollonian circles having the same foci. We will show that these families of curves generate trivial 3-webs and find the exact formulas describing them.
This article highlights interactions of diverse areas: the Heron formula for the area of a triangle, the Descartes circle equation, and right triangles with integer or rational sides. New and old results are synthesized. We show that every primitive Pythagorean triple (PPT), furnishes a Descartes quadruple of tangent circles with integral curvatures, and so generates an integral Apollonian packing (IAP) containing a rectangle of centers. Thus Pythagorean triples serve to generate a large number of in-equivalent integral packings.
We prove that given a fixed radius $r$, the set of isometry-invariant probability measures supported on ``periodic'' radius $r$-circle packings of the hyperbolic plane is dense in the space of all isometry-invariant probability measures on the space of radius $r$-circle packings. By a periodic packing, we mean one with cofinite symmetry group. As a corollary, we prove the maximum density achieved by isometry-invariant probability measures on a space of radius $r$-packings of the hyperbolic plane is the supremum of densities of periodic packings. We also show that the maximum density function v…
In his talk "Integral Apollonian disk Packings" Peter Sarnak asked if there is a "proof from the Book" of the Descartes theorem on circles. A candidate for such a proof is presented in this note
A simple proof of Thue theorem on Circle Packing is given. The proof is only based on density analysis of Delaunay triangulation for the set of points that are centers of circles in a saturated circle configuration.
A notion of random walks for circle packings is introduced. The geometry behind this notion is discussed, together with some applications. In particular, we obtain a short proof of a result regarding the type problem for circle packings, which shows that the type of a circle packing is closely related to the type of its tangency graph.
The Apollonian circle packing, generated from three mutually-tangent circles in the plane, has inspired over the past half-century the study of other classes of space-filling packings, both in two and in higher dimensions. Recently, Kontorovich and Nakamura introduced the notion of crystallographic sphere packings, $n$-dimensional packings of spheres with symmetry groups that are isometries of $\mathbb{H}^{n+1}$. There exist at least three sources which give rise to crystallographic packings, namely polyhedra, reflective extended Bianchi groups, and various higher dimensional quadratic forms. …
It has been shown that univalent circle packings filling in the complex plane $\bold C$ are unique up to similarities of $\bold C$. Here we prove that bounded degree branched circle packings properly covering $\bold C$ are uniquely determined, up to similarities of $\bold C$, by their branch sets. In particular, when branch sets of the packings considered are empty we obtain the earlier result. We also establish a circle packing analogue of Liouville's theorem: if $f$ is a circle packing map whose domain packing is infinite, univalent, and has recurrent tangency graph, then the ratio map assoc…
We consider circle packings in the plane with circles of sizes $1$, $r\simeq 0.834$ and $s\simeq 0.651$. These sizes are algebraic numbers which allow a compact packing, that is, a packing in which each hole is formed by three mutually tangent circles. Compact packings are believed to maximize the density when there are possible. We prove that it is indeed the case for these sizes. The proof should be generalizable to other sizes which allow compact packings and is a first step towards a general result.
In this note we give a simple proof of the classical fact that the hexagonal lattice gives the highest density circle packing among all lattices in $R^2$. With the benefit of hindsight, we show that the problem can be restricted to the important class of well-rounded lattices, on which the density function takes a particularly simple form. Our proof emphasizes the role of well-rounded lattices for discrete optimization problems.
We present a new self-contained proof of the well-known fact that the minimal area of a Voronoi cell in a unit circle packing is equal to $2\sqrt{3}$, and the minimum is achieved only on a perfect hexagon. The proof is short and, in our opinion, instructive.
The famous Kepler conjecture has a less spectacular, two-dimensional equivalent: The theorem of Thue states that the densest circle packing in the Euclidean plane has a hexagonal structure. A common proof uses Voronoi cells and analyzes their area applying Jensen's inequality on convex functions to receive a local estimate which is globally valid. Based on the concept of Voronoi cells, we will introduce a new tessellation into so-called L-triangles which can be related to fundamental parallelograms of lattice circle packings. Therefore a globally disordered circle packing can be reduced to loc…
We use recent advances in circle packing theory to develop a constructive method for the approximation of an analytic function $F:Ω\to \bold C$ by circle packing maps providing we have only been given $Ω$, $|F'|\big|_Ω$, and the set of critical points of $F$. This extends the earlier result of Ithiel Carter and Burt Rodin [CR] for $F$ with no critical points.
We find explicit formulas for the radii and locations of the circles in all the optimally dense packings of two, three or four equal circles on any flat torus, defined to be the quotient of the Euclidean plane by the lattice generated by two independent vectors. We prove the optimality of the arrangements using techniques from rigidity theory and topological graph theory.
This paper encompasses the mathematical derivations of the analytic and generalized formula and recurrence relations to find out the radii of n umber of circles inscribed or packed in the plane region bounded by circular arcs (including sectors, semi and quarter circles) & the straight lines. The values of radii obtained using analytic formula and recurrence relations have been verified by comparing with those obtained using MATLAB codes. The methods used in this paper for packing circles are deterministic unlike heuristic strategies and optimization techniques. The analytic formulae derived f…
We consider packings of congruent circles on a square flat torus, i.e., periodic (w.r.t. a square lattice) planar circle packings, with the maximal circle radius. This problem is interesting due to a practical reason - the problem of "super resolution of images." We have found optimal arrangements for N=6, 7 and 8 circles. Surprisingly, for the case N=7 there are three different optimal arrangements. Our proof is based on a computer enumeration of toroidal irreducible contact graphs.
We study circle packings with the combinatorics of a triangulated disk in the plane and parametrize deformations of circle packings in terms of vertex rotation and cross ratios. We show that there is a Weierstrass representation formula relating infinitesimal deformations of circle packings to discrete minimal surfaces of Koebe type. Furthermore, every minimal surface of Koebe type can be extended naturally to a discrete minimal surface of general type. In this way, discrete minimal surfaces via Steiner's formula are unified.
Recently, Connelly and Gortler gave a novel proof of the circle packing theorem for tangency packings by introducing a hybrid combinatorial-geometric operation, flip-and-flow, that allows two tangency packings whose contact graphs differ by a combinatorial edge flip to be continuously deformed from one to the other while maintaining tangencies across all of their common edges. Starting from a canonical tangency circle packing with the desired number of circles a finite sequence of flip-and-flow operations may be applied to obtain a circle packing for any desired (proper) contact graph with the…
Circle packings with specified patterns of tangencies form a discrete counterpart of analytic functions. In this paper we study univalent packings (with a combinatorial closed disk as tangent graph) which are embedded in (or fill) a bounded, simply connected domain. We introduce the concept of crosscuts and investigate the rigidity of circle packings with respect to maximal crosscuts. The main result is a discrete version of an indentity theorem for analytic functions (in the spirit of Schwarz' Lemma), which has implications to uniqueness statements for discrete conformal mappings.
A compact circle-packing $P$ of the Euclidean plane is a set of circles which bound mutually disjoint open discs with the property that, for every circle $S\in P$, there exists a maximal indexed set $\{A_{0},\ldots,A_{n-1}\}\subseteq P$ so that, for every $i\in\{0,\ldots,n-1\}$, the circle $A_{i}$ is tangent to both circles $S$ and $A_{i+1\mod n}.$ We show that there exist at most $13617$ pairs $(r,s)$ with $0<s<r<1$ for which there exist a compact circle-packing of the plane consisting of circles with radii $s$, $r$ and $1$. We discuss computing the exact values of such $0<s<r<1$ as roots of …
Recently, we enumerate up to isometry, all locally rigid circle packings on the unit sphere with number of circles N<12. This problem is equivalent to the enumeration of irreducible contact graphs. In this paper we show that by using the list of irreducible graphs can solve various problems of extreme packings such as the Tammes problem for the sphere and the projective plane, the maximal contacts problem, Danzer's and other problems on irreducible contact graphs.
We say that a tiling separates discs of a packing in the Euclidean plane, if each tile contains exactly one member of the packing. It is a known elementary geometric problem to show that for each locally finite packing of circular discs, there exists a separating tiling with convex polygons. In this paper we show that this separating property remains true for circle packings on the sphere and in the hyperbolic plane. Moreover, we show that in the Euclidean plane circles are the only convex discs, whose packings with similar copies can be always separated by polygonal tilings. The analogous sta…
We use computational experiments to find the rectangles of minimum area into which a given number n of non-overlapping congruent circles can be packed. No assumption is made on the shape of the rectangles. Most of the packings found have the usual regular square or hexagonal pattern. However, for 1495 values of n in the tested range n =< 5000, specifically, for n = 49, 61, 79, 97, 107,... 4999, we prove that the optimum cannot possibly be achieved by such regular arrangements. The evidence suggests that the limiting height-to-width ratio of rectangles containing an optimal hexagonal packing of…
Given a finite simple triangulation, we estimate the sizes of circles in its circle packing in terms of Cannon's vertex extremal length. Our estimates provide control over the size of the largest circle in the packing. We use them, combined with results from [12], to prove that in a proper circle packing of the discrete mating-of-trees random map model of Duplantier, Gwynne, Miller and Sheffield, the size of the largest circle goes to zero with high probability.
For each k >= 1 and corresponding hexagonal number h(k) = 3k(k+1)+1, we introduce m(k) = max[(k-1)!/ 2, 1] packings of h(k) equal disks inside a circle which we call "the curved hexagonal packings". The curved hexagonal packing of 7 disks (k = 1, m(1)=1) is well known and the one of 19 disks (k = 2, m(2)=1) has been previously conjectured to be optimal. New curved hexagonal packings of 37, 61, and 91 disks (k = 3, 4, and 5, m(3)=1, m(4)=3, and m(5)=12) were the densest we obtained on a computer using a so-called "billiards" simulation algorithm. A curved hexagonal packing pattern is invariant …
We consider the hexagonal circle packing with radius 1/2 and perturb it by letting the circles move as independent Brownian motions for time t. It is shown that, for large enough t, if Π_t is the point process given by the center of the circles at time t, then, as t\to\infty, the critical radius for circles centered at Π_t to contain an infinite component converges to that of continuum percolation (which was shown---based on a Monte Carlo estimate---by Balister, Bollobás and Walters to be strictly bigger than 1/2). On the other hand, for small enough t, we show (using a Monte Carlo estimate fo…
