Growing Classifications: Widths, Ehrhart Theory and Spherical Geometry

This thesis focuses on three classifications of convex polytopes, which are separate, but the methods of each influences those that follow. There are links to combinatorial algebraic geometry throughout, particularly to toric and spherical geometry. This is most explicit in the third project, which...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Hamm, Girtrude
Format: Thesis (University of Nottingham only)
Language:English
Published: 2025
Subjects:
Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/80626/
_version_ 1848801259526553600
author Hamm, Girtrude
author_facet Hamm, Girtrude
author_sort Hamm, Girtrude
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description This thesis focuses on three classifications of convex polytopes, which are separate, but the methods of each influences those that follow. There are links to combinatorial algebraic geometry throughout, particularly to toric and spherical geometry. This is most explicit in the third project, which is additionally a classification of certain spherical varieties. In the first project we introduce the multi-width of a polytope, which is an extension of its lattice width. We study the classification of lattice simplices by their multi-width in dimensions two and three. This is motivated by computational questions in toric geometry. We completely classify lattice triangles by their multi-width and also classify lattice tetrahedra of small multi-width. The second project concerns the Ehrhart theory of rational polygons. The Ehrhart theory of lattice polygons is already well understood and here we make steps towards a similar understanding of denominator two polygons. We classify denominator two polygons containing up to four lattice points, including a description of infinite families of polygons with no interior points. Using this data, we completely classify the Ehrhart polynomials of denominator two polygons with zero interior points and find three sharp bounds on the coefficients when there are interior points. In the final project we study spherical varieties, which generalise toric and flag varieties. We discuss isomorphisms between spherical varieties and describe a class of lattice automorphisms which are induced by isomorphisms of spherical varieties. We define a normal form for lattice polytopes up to this group of automorphisms. This normal form is vital to our classification of spherical canonical Fano four-folds. Like toric Fano varieties, spherical Fano varieties correspond to polytopes. Therefore, we can classify the varieties by classifying the corresponding polytopes.
first_indexed 2025-11-14T21:04:37Z
format Thesis (University of Nottingham only)
id nottingham-80626
institution University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus
institution_category Local University
language English
last_indexed 2025-11-14T21:04:37Z
publishDate 2025
recordtype eprints
repository_type Digital Repository
spelling nottingham-806262025-07-31T04:40:20Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/80626/ Growing Classifications: Widths, Ehrhart Theory and Spherical Geometry Hamm, Girtrude This thesis focuses on three classifications of convex polytopes, which are separate, but the methods of each influences those that follow. There are links to combinatorial algebraic geometry throughout, particularly to toric and spherical geometry. This is most explicit in the third project, which is additionally a classification of certain spherical varieties. In the first project we introduce the multi-width of a polytope, which is an extension of its lattice width. We study the classification of lattice simplices by their multi-width in dimensions two and three. This is motivated by computational questions in toric geometry. We completely classify lattice triangles by their multi-width and also classify lattice tetrahedra of small multi-width. The second project concerns the Ehrhart theory of rational polygons. The Ehrhart theory of lattice polygons is already well understood and here we make steps towards a similar understanding of denominator two polygons. We classify denominator two polygons containing up to four lattice points, including a description of infinite families of polygons with no interior points. Using this data, we completely classify the Ehrhart polynomials of denominator two polygons with zero interior points and find three sharp bounds on the coefficients when there are interior points. In the final project we study spherical varieties, which generalise toric and flag varieties. We discuss isomorphisms between spherical varieties and describe a class of lattice automorphisms which are induced by isomorphisms of spherical varieties. We define a normal form for lattice polytopes up to this group of automorphisms. This normal form is vital to our classification of spherical canonical Fano four-folds. Like toric Fano varieties, spherical Fano varieties correspond to polytopes. Therefore, we can classify the varieties by classifying the corresponding polytopes. 2025-07-31 Thesis (University of Nottingham only) NonPeerReviewed application/pdf en cc_by https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/80626/1/Thesis%20-%20corrected.pdf Hamm, Girtrude (2025) Growing Classifications: Widths, Ehrhart Theory and Spherical Geometry. PhD thesis, University of Nottingham. convex polytopes polytope classification algebraic geometry
spellingShingle convex polytopes
polytope classification
algebraic geometry
Hamm, Girtrude
Growing Classifications: Widths, Ehrhart Theory and Spherical Geometry
title Growing Classifications: Widths, Ehrhart Theory and Spherical Geometry
title_full Growing Classifications: Widths, Ehrhart Theory and Spherical Geometry
title_fullStr Growing Classifications: Widths, Ehrhart Theory and Spherical Geometry
title_full_unstemmed Growing Classifications: Widths, Ehrhart Theory and Spherical Geometry
title_short Growing Classifications: Widths, Ehrhart Theory and Spherical Geometry
title_sort growing classifications: widths, ehrhart theory and spherical geometry
topic convex polytopes
polytope classification
algebraic geometry
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/80626/