Calculus of Variations and Geometric Measure Theory

M. Caroccia - K. Demason - F. Maggi

On the emergence of almost-honeycomb structures in low-energy planar clusters

created by caroccia on 15 Sep 2025
modified on 14 Sep 2026

[BibTeX]

Published Paper

Inserted: 15 sep 2025
Last Updated: 14 sep 2026

Journal: Journal of Functional Analysis
Volume: 290
Number: 2
Year: 2025
Doi: 10.1016/j.jfa.2025.111205

Abstract:

Several commonly observed physical and biological systems are arranged in shapes that closely resemble an honeycomb cluster, that is, a tessellation of the plane by regular hexagons. Although these shapes are not always the direct product of energy minimization, they can still be understood, at least phenomenologically, as low-energy configurations. In this paper, explicit quantitative estimates on the geometry of such low-energy configurations are provided, showing in particular that the vast majority of the chambers must be generalized polygons with six edges, and be closely resembling regular hexagons. Part of our arguments is a detailed revision of the estimates behind the global isoperimetric principle for honeycomb clusters due to Hales.

Keywords: stability inequalities, isoperimetric problems, Honeycomb Theorem, N-clusters


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