We describe a new numerical procedure for generating dense packings of disks and spheres inside various geometric shapes. We believe that in some of the smaller cases, these packings are in fact optimal. When applied to the previously studied cases of packing n equal disks in a square, the procedure confirms all the previous record packings except for n = 32, 37, 48, and 50 disks, where better packings than those previously recorded are found. For n = 32 and 48, the new packings are minor variations of the previous record packings. However, for n = 37 and 50, the new patterns differ substantially. For example, they are mirror-symmetric, while the previous record packings are not.
In previous work a probabilistic approach to controlling difficulties of density in hyperbolic space led to a workable notion of optimal density for packings of bodies. In this paper we extend an ergodic theorem of Nevo to provide an appropriate definition of optimal dense packings. Examples are given to illustrate various aspects of the density problem, in particular the shift in emphasis from the analysis of individual packings to spaces of packings.
In this paper we construct a new family of lattice packings for superballs in three dimensions (unit balls for the $l^p_3$ norm) with $p \in (1, 1.58]$. We conjecture that the family also exists for $p \in (1.58, \log_2 3 = 1.5849625\ldots]$. Like in the densest lattice packing of regular octahedra, each superball in our family of lattice packings has $14$ neighbors.
In "Dense Sphere Packings: A Blueprint for Formal Proofs" Hales proves that for every packing of unit spheres, the density in a ball of radius $r$ is at most $π/\sqrt{18}+c/r$ for some constant $c$. When $r$ tends to infinity, this gives a proof to the famous Kepler conjecture. As formulated by Hales, $c$ depends on the packing. We follow the proofs of Hales to calculate a constant $c'$ independent of the sphere packing that exists as mentioned in "A Formal Proof of the Kepler Conjecture" by Hales et al..
We investigate, by "a la Marcinkiewicz" techniques applied to the (asymptotic) density function, how dense systems of equal spheres of $\rb^{n}, n \geq 1,$ can be partitioned at infinity in order to allow the computation of their density as a true limit and not a limsup. The density of a packing of equal balls is the norm 1 of the characteristic function of the systems of balls in the sense of Marcinkiewicz. Existence Theorems for densest sphere packings and completely saturated sphere packings of maximal density are given new direct proofs.
It is well known that the vertices of any Euclidean simplicial regular polytope determine an optimal packing of equal spherical balls. We prove a stability version of optimal order of this result.
One of the basic problems in discrete geometry is to determine the most efficient packing of congruent replicas of a given convex set $K$ in the plane or in space. The most commonly used measure of efficiency is density. Several types of the problem arise depending on the type of isometries allowed for the packing: packing by translates, lattice packing, translates and point reflections, or all isometries. Due to its connections with number theory, crystallography, etc., lattice packing has been studied most extensively. In two dimensions the theory is fairly well developed, and there are seve…
In 1900, as a part of his 18th problem, Hilbert proposed the question to determine the densest congruent (or translative) packings of a given solid, such as the unit ball or the regular tetrahedron of unit edges. Up to now, our knowledge about this problem is still very limited, excepting the ball case. It is conjectured that, for some particular solids such as tetrahedra, cuboctahedra and octahedra, their maximal translative packing densities and their maximal lattice packing densities are identical. To attack this conjecture, this paper suggests a computer approach to determine the maximal l…
Suppose one has a collection of disks of various sizes with disjoint interiors, a packing in the plane, and suppose the ratio of the smallest radius divided by the largest radius lies between $1$ and $q$. In his 1964 book Regular Figures (MR0165423), László Fejes Tóth found a series of packings that were his best guess for the maximum density for any $1 > q > 0.2$. Meanwhile Gerd Blind in (MR0275291, MR0377702) proved that for $1 \ge q > 0.72$, the most dense packing possible is $π/\sqrt{12}$, which is when all the disks are the same size. In Regular Figures, the upper bound of the ratio $q$ s…
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.
The ball (or sphere) packing problem with equal balls, without any symmetry assumption, in a $3$-dimensional space of constant curvature was settled by Böröczky and Florian for the hyperbolic space $\HYP$ in \cite{BF64} and by proving the famous Kepler conjecture by Hales \cite{H} for the Euclidean space $\EUC$. The goal of this paper is to extend the problem of finding the densest geodesic ball (or sphere) packing for the other $3$-dimensional homogeneous geometries (Thurston geometries) $$ \SXR,~\HXR,~\SLR,~\NIL,~\SOL, $$ where a transitive symmetry group of the ball packing is assumed, one …
Packings of equal disks in the plane are known to have density at most $π/\sqrt{12}$, although this density is never achieved in the square torus, which is what we call the plane modulo the square lattice. We find packings of disks in a square torus that we conjecture to be the most dense for certain numbers of packing disks, using continued fractions to approximate $1/\sqrt{3}$ and $2-\sqrt{3}$. We also define a constant to measure the efficiency of a packing motived by a related constant due to Markov for continued fractions. One idea is to use the unique factorization property of Gaussian i…
A \emph{cylinder packing} is a family of congruent infinite circular cylinders with mutually disjoint interiors in $3$-dimensional Euclidean space. The \emph{local density} of a cylinder packing is the ratio between the volume occupied by the cylinders within a given sphere and the volume of the entire sphere. The \emph{global density} of the cylinder packing is obtained by letting the radius of the sphere approach infinity. It is known that the greatest global density is obtained when all cylinders are parallel to each other and each cylinder is surrounded by exactly six others. In this case,…
In $n$-dimensional hyperbolic space $\mathbf{H}^n$ $(n\ge2)$ there are $3$-types of spheres (balls): the sphere, horosphere and hypersphere. If $n=2,3$ we know an universal upper bound of the ball packing densities, where each ball volume is related to the volume of the corresponding Dirichlet-Voronoi (D-V) cell. E.g. in $\mathbf{H}^3$ the densest horoball packing is derived from the $\{3,3,6\}$ Coxeter tiling consisting of ideal regular simplices $T_{reg}^\infty$ with dihedral angles $\fracπ{3}$. The density of this packing is $δ_3^\infty\approx 0.85328$ and this provides a very rough upper b…
The goal of this paper to determine the optimal horoball packing arrangements and their densities for all four fully asymptotic Coxeter tilings (Coxeter honeycombs) in hyperbolic 3-space $\mathbb{H}^3$. Centers of horoballs are required to lie at vertices of the regular polyhedral cells constituting the tiling. We allow horoballs of different types at the various vertices. Our results are derived through a generalization of the projective methodology for hyperbolic spaces. The main result states that the known Böröczky--Florian density upper bound for "congruent horoball" packings of $\mathbb{…
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 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…
The determination of the densest packings of regular tetrahedra (one of the five Platonic solids) is attracting great attention as evidenced by the rapid pace at which packing records are being broken and the fascinating packing structures that have emerged. Here we provide the most general analytical formulation to date to construct dense periodic packings of tetrahedra with four particles per fundamental cell. This analysis results in six-parameter family of dense tetrahedron packings that includes as special cases recently discovered "dimer" packings of tetrahedra, including the densest kno…
The determination of the densest packings of regular tetrahedra (one of the five Platonic solids) is attracting great attention as evidenced by the rapid pace at which packing records are being broken and the fascinating packing structures that have emerged. We have discovered the densest known packings of regular tetrahedra with a density $ϕ= {12250/14319} = 0.855506...$. These packings are special cases of an analytical two-parameter family of dense periodic packings with four particles per fundamental cell that we have constructed here. From this family, we can recover a set of recent packi…
A new locally averaged density for sphere packing in R^3 is defined by a proper combination of the local cell (Voronoi cell) and Delaunay decompositions (§1.2.2), using only a single layer of surrounding spheres. Local packings attaining the optimal estimate of such a local invariant must be either the f.c.c. or h.c.p. local packings (Theorem I). The main purpose of this paper is to provide a clean-cut proof of this strong uniqueness result via geometric invariant theory. This result also leads to simple proofs of Kepler's conjecture on sphere packing, least action principle of crystal formati…
The problem of packing a system of particles as densely as possible is foundational in the field of discrete geometry and is a powerful model in the material and biological sciences. As packing problems retreat from the reach of solution by analytic constructions, the importance of an efficient numerical method for conducting \textit{de novo} (from-scratch) searches for dense packings becomes crucial. In this paper, we use the \textit{divide and concur} framework to develop a general search method for the solution of periodic constraint problems, and we apply it to the discovery of dense perio…
We analyze the general problem of determining optimally dense packings, in a Euclidean or hyperbolic space, of congruent copies of some fixed finite set of bodies. We are strongly guided by examples of aperiodic tilings in Euclidean space and a detailed analysis of a new family of examples in the hyperbolic plane. Our goal is to understand qualitative features of such optimum density problems, in particular the appropriate meaning of the uniqueness of solutions, and the role of symmetry in classfying optimally dense packings.
In this paper using the concept of the extended Hamming code we give a construction for dense packing of points at distance at least one in such unit cubes which dimension are a power of two.
We present a method for discovering dense packings of general convex hard particles and apply it to study the dense packing behavior of a one-parameter family of particles with tetrahedral symmetry representing a deformation of the ideal mathematical tetrahedron into a less ideal, physical, tetrahedron and all the way to the sphere. Thus, we also connect the two well studied problems of sphere packing and tetrahedron packing on a single axis. Our numerical results uncover a rich optimal-packing behavior, compared to that of other continuous families of particles previously studied. We present …
We present the densest known packing of regular tetrahedra with density phi = 4000/4671 = 0.856347... Like the recently discovered packings of Kallus et al. [arXiv:0910.5226] and Torquato-Jiao [arXiv:0912.4210], our packing is crystalline with a unit cell of four tetrahedra forming two triangular dipyramids (dimer clusters). We show that our packing has maximal density within a three-parameter family of dimer packings. Numerical compressions starting from random configurations suggest that the packing may be optimal at least for small cells with up to 16 tetrahedra and periodic boundaries.
We present a one-parameter family of periodic packings of regular tetrahedra, with the packing fraction $100/117\approx0.8547$, that are simple in the sense that they are transitive and their repeating units involve only four tetrahedra. The construction of the packings was inspired from results of a numerical search that yielded a similar packing. We present an analytic construction of the packings and a description of their properties. We also present a transitive packing with a repeating unit of two tetrahedra and a packing fraction $\frac{139+40\sqrt{10}}{369}\approx0.7194$.
We examine sequences of dense packings of n congruent non-overlapping disks inside a square which follow specific patterns as n increases along certain values, n = n(1), n(2),... n(k),.... Extending and improving previous work of Nurmela and Ostergard where previous patterns for n = n(k) of the form k*k, k*k-1, k*k-3, k(k+1), and 4k*k+k were observed, we identify new patterns for n = k*k-2 and n = k*k+[k/2]. We also find denser packings than those in [Nurmela, Ostergard] for n =21, 28, 34, 40, 43, 44, 45, and 47. In addition, we produce what we conjecture to be optimal packings for n =51, 52, …
We give a new proof of the Minkowski-Hlawka bound on the existence of dense lattices. The proof is based on an elementary method for constructing dense lattices which is almost effective.
We introduce a new method from number fields and codes to construct dense packings in the Euclidean spaces. Via the canonical $\mathbb{Q}$-embedding of arbitrary number field $K$ into $\mathbb{R}^{[K:\mathbb{Q}]}$, both the prime ideal $\mathfrak{p}$ and its residue field $κ$ can be embedded as discrete subsets in $\mathbb{R}^{[K:\mathbb{Q}]}$. Thus we can concatenate the embedding image of the Cartesian product of $n$ copies of $\mathfrak{p}$ together with the image of a length $n$ code over $κ$. This concatenation leads to a packing in Euclidean space $\mathbb{R}^{n[K:\mathbb{Q}]}$. Moreover…
We have formulated the problem of generating periodic dense paritcle packings as an optimization problem called the Adaptive Shrinking Cell (ASC) formulation [S. Torquato and Y. Jiao, Phys. Rev. E {\bf 80}, 041104 (2009)]. Because the objective function and impenetrability constraints can be exactly linearized for sphere packings with a size distribution in $d$-dimensional Euclidean space $\mathbb{R}^d$, it is most suitable and natural to solve the corresponding ASC optimization problem using sequential linear programming (SLP) techniques. We implement an SLP solution to produce robustly a wid…
Several conditions are given when a packing of equal disks in a torus is locally maximally dense, where the torus is defined as the quotient of the plane by a two-dimensional lattice. Conjectures are presented that claim that the density of any strictly jammed packings, whose graph does not consist of all triangles and the torus lattice is the standard triangular lattice, is at most $\frac{n}{n+1}\fracπ{\sqrt{12}}$, where $n$ is the number of packing disks. Several classes of collectively jammed packings are presented where the conjecture holds.
We show that given any six numbers $r,s,t,u,v,w \in (0,1]$ satisfying $r \leq s \leq \min(t,u) \leq \max(t,u) \leq v \leq w$, it is possible to construct a compact subset of $[0,1]$ with Hausdorff dimension equal to $r$, lower modified box dimension equal to $s$, packing dimension equal to $t$, lower box dimension equal to $u$, upper box dimension equal to $v$ and Assouad dimension equal to $w$. Moreover, the set constructed is an $r$-Hausdorff set and a $t$-packing set.
Previously published packings of equal disks in an equilateral triangle have dealt with up to 21 disks. We use a new discrete-event simulation algorithm to produce packings for up to 34 disks. For each n in the range 22 =< n =< 34 we present what we believe to be the densest possible packing of n equal disks in an equilateral triangle. For these n we also list the second, often the third and sometimes the fourth best packings among those that we found. In each case, the structure of the packing implies that the minimum distance d(n) between disk centers is the root of polynomial P_n with integ…
