Geometrical Probability and Random Points on a Hypersphere
Cover, Thomas M. ; Efron, Bradley
Ann. Math. Statist., Tome 38 (1967) no. 6, p. 213-220 / Harvested from Project Euclid
This paper is concerned with the properties of convex cones and their dual cones generated by points randomly distributed on the surface of a $d$-sphere. For radially symmetric distributions on the points, the expected number of $k$-faces and natural measure of the set of $k$-faces will be found. The expected number of vertices, or extreme points, of convex hulls of random points in $E^2$ and $E^3$ has been investigated by Renyi and Sulanke [4] and Efron [2]. In general these results depend critically on the distribution of the points. However, for points on a sphere, the situation is much simpler. Except for a requirement of radial symmetry of the distribution on the points, the properties developed in this paper will be distribution-free. (This lack of dependence on the underlying distribution suggests certain simple nonparametric tests for radial symmetry--we shall not pursue this matter here, however.) Our approach is combinatorial and geometric, involving the systematic description of the partitioning of $E^d$ by $N$ hyperplanes through the origin. After a series of theorems counting the number of faces of cones and their duals, we are led to Theorem 5 and its probabilistic counterpart Theorem 2', the primary result of this paper, in which the expected solid angle is found of the convex cone spanned by $N$ random vectors in $E^d$.
Publié le : 1967-02-14
Classification: 
@article{1177699073,
     author = {Cover, Thomas M. and Efron, Bradley},
     title = {Geometrical Probability and Random Points on a Hypersphere},
     journal = {Ann. Math. Statist.},
     volume = {38},
     number = {6},
     year = {1967},
     pages = { 213-220},
     language = {en},
     url = {http://dml.mathdoc.fr/item/1177699073}
}
Cover, Thomas M.; Efron, Bradley. Geometrical Probability and Random Points on a Hypersphere. Ann. Math. Statist., Tome 38 (1967) no. 6, pp.  213-220. http://gdmltest.u-ga.fr/item/1177699073/