A Minkowski class is a closed subset of the space of convex bodies in Euclidean space ℝn which is closed under Minkowski addition and non-negative dilatations. A convex body in ℝn is universal if the expansion of its support function in spherical harmonics contains non-zero harmonics of all orders. If K is universal, then a dense class of convex bodies M has the following property. There exist convex bodies T1, T2 such that M + T1 = T2, and T1, T2 belong to the rotation invariant Minkowski class generated by K. It is shown that every convex body K which is not centrally symmetric has a linear image, arbitrarily close to K, which is universal. A modified version of the result holds for centrally symmetric convex bodies. In this way, a result of S. Alesker is strengthened, and at the same time given a more elementary proof.

The kth projection function of a convex body K ⊂ ℝn assigns to any k-dimensional linear subspace of ℝn the k-volume of the orthogonal projection of K to that subspace. Let K and K0 be convex bodies in ℝn, and let K0 be centrally symmetric and satisfy a weak regularity and curvature condition (which includes all K0 with ∂K0 of class C2 with positive radii of curvature). Assume that K and K0 have proportional 1st projection functions (i.e., width functions) and proportional kth projection functions. For 2 ≤ k < (n + 1)/2 and for k = 3, n = 5, it is shown that K and K0 are homothetic. In the special case where K0 is a Euclidean ball, characterizations of Euclidean balls as convex bodies of constant width and constant k-brightness are thus obtained.

Let be a family of axis-aligned parallelotopes, or boxes, in ℝd. Denote by fk () the number of subfamilies of of size k + 1 with non-empty intersection. In an earlier paper, the author proved that, if f0 () = n and fr() = 0, then fk() ≤ fk(n, d, r) for k = 1,…,r − 1, where fk(n, d, r) is some explicitly given number. The result is best possible for all k. Here it is shown that, if equality is attained for some such k, then equality is attained for each such k.

Variations and generalizations of several classical theorems concerning characterizations of ellipsoids are developed. In particular, these lead to a short and comprehensible proof of the false centre theorem.

Let K be a convex body of dimension at least 3, and let p0 be a point. If every section of K through p0 is centrally symmetric, then Rogers proved in [6] that K is centrally symmetric, although p0 may not be the centre of K. If this is the case, then Aitchison, Petty and Rogers [1] and Larman [2] proved that K must be an ellipsoid. Suppose now that, for every direction, we can choose continuously a section of K that is centrally symmetric; if K is strictly convex, then Montejano [3] proved that K must be centrally symmetric. Consider now the following example. Let D be a (euclidean) ball centred at the origin from which two symmetric caps are deleted. Then D is centrally symmetric with respect to the origin, and has a lot of circular sections whose centre is not the origin. In fact, we can choose continuously, for every direction, a section of D which is centrally symmetric, in such a way that not all these sections pass through the origin. Nevertheless, no matter how we choose these sections, there are always necessarily many of them that do pass through the origin. For those sections, of course, we have not imposed any condition, which explains the fact that D is not a quadric elsewhere.

Let E be a level 1, vector valued Eisenstein series of half-integral weight, normalized so that the coefficients are all in ℤ. It is shown that there is a level one vector valued cusp form f with the same weight as E and with coefficients in ℤ, which is congruent to E modulo the constant term of E.

Let υ be a Henselian valuation of arbitrary rank of a field K, and let ῡ be the (unique) extension of v to a fixed algebraic closure of K. For an element α ∈ \K, a chain α = α0, α1,…,αr of elements of , such that αi is of minimum degree over K with the property that ῡ(αi−1 − αi) = sup{ῡ(αi−1 − β) | [K (β) : K] < [K (αi−1) : K]} and that αr ∈ K, is called a saturated distinguished chain for α with respect to (K, υ). The notion of a saturated distinguished chain has been used to obtain results about the irreducible polynomials over any complete discrete rank one valued field K and to determine various arithmetic and metric invariants associated to elements of (cf. [J. Number Theory, 52 (1995), 98–118.] and [J. Algebra, 266 (2003), 14–26]). In this paper, a method is described of constructing a saturated distinguished chain for α, and also determining explicitly some invariants associated to α, when the degree of the extension K (α)/K is not divisible by the characteristic of the residue field of υ.

Let κ be an infinite cardinal. Okuyama showed that the product space X ×i Y of a paracompact weak P (ω)-space X and a K-analytic space Y is paracompact. In this paper, by using the notion of κ-K-analytic spaces which is basically defined by Hansell, Jayne and Rogers, the above result is extended and some other results are given related to normality, collectionwise normality and covering properties on products. An answer to a question of Okuyama and Watson is also given, as well as some applications to extensions of continuous functions on these products.

A new lower bound is established for the distance between two roots of an integer polynomial, and a new upper bound for the distance between a given real number and the set of zeros of an integer polynomial. The latter result is applied to improve a metrical result in Diophantine approximation.

Let X ⊂ ℙN be a geometrically integral cubic hypersurface defined over ℚ, with singular locus of dimension at most dim X − 4. The main result in this paper is a proof of the fact that X(ℚ) contains OɛX (BdimX + ɛ) points of height at most B.

In this article, a discrete mean value of the derivative of the Riemann zeta function is computed. This mean value will be important for several applications concerning the size of ζ′(ρ), where ζ(s) is the Riemann zeta function and ρ is a non-trivial zero of ζ(s).

This paper treats a simple model, which can be exactly solved, motivated by the back-and-forth motion of ocean bacteria. In particular, the probability is determined that a bacterium moving randomly along a fluid line through the origin in a linear shear flow hits the origin before time t.

Algorithms are introduced that produce optimal Markovian couplings for large finite-state-space discrete-time Markov chains with sparse transition matrices; these algorithms are applied to some toy models motivated by fluid-dynamical mixing problems at high Peclét number. An alternative definition of the time-scale of a mixing process is suggested. Finally, these algorithms are applied to the problem of coupling diffusion processes in an acute-angled triangle, and some of the simplifications that occur in continuum coupling problems are discussed.

In this paper a method is developed for the asymptotic expansion of some classes of integral as a parameter k → 0+. The procedure is analogous to the method of inner and outer sums for treating certain types of infinite series whose terms contain a small parameter, and can involve heavy algebra. However, this aspect of the process can be delegated to a symbolic manipulation package.