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On The Kakeya Constant

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

F. Cunningham Jr.
Affiliation:
Bryn Mawr College, The University of Pennsylvania, and Mathematics Research Center, U.S. Army, University of Wisconsin
I. J. Schoenberg
Affiliation:
Bryn Mawr College, The University of Pennsylvania, and Mathematics Research Center, U.S. Army, University of Wisconsin
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We shall say that a plane set D has the Kakeya property if a unit segment can be turned continuously in D through 360° back to its original position. The famous solution of this problem by A. S. Besicovitch (1; 2; 4; 5; 6), to the effect that there are sets of arbitrarily small area having the Kayeka property, leaves open the problem obtained by adding the new condition that the set D be also simply connected. Since we do not know whether there is an attainable minimum, we define the Kakeya constant K to be the greatest lower bound of areas of simply connected sets having the Kakeya property. We shall refer to such sets as Kakeya sets.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Mathematical Society 1965

References

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