Three-dimensional polyhedra can be described by three polynomial inequalities

Abstract

Bosse et al. conjectured that for every natural number $d \ge 2$ and every $d$-dimensional polytope $P$ in $\real^d$ there exist $d$ polynomials $p_0(x),...,p_{d-1}(x)$ satisfying $P=\{x \in \mathbb{R}^d : p_0(x) \ge 0, >..., p_{d-1}(x) \ge 0 \}.$ We show that for dimensions $d \le 3$ even every $d$-dimensional polyhedron can be described by $d$ polynomial inequalities. The proof of our result is constructive.