Fixing a hole

Abstract

We show that any finite $S \subset \mathbb{R}^d$ in general position has arbitrarily large supersets $T \supseteq S$ in general position with the property that $T$ contains no empty convex polygon, or hole, with $C_d$ points, where $C_d$ is an integer that depends only on the dimension $d$. This generalises results of Horton and Valtr which treat the case $S = \emptyset$. The key step in our proof, which may be of independent interest, is to show that there are arbitrarily small perturbations of the set of lattice points $[n]^d$ with no large holes.