The Minkowski problem in Heisenberg groups

Abstract

As we all know, the Minkowski type problem is the cornerstone of the Brunn-Minkowski theory in Euclidean space. The Heisenberg group as a sub-Riemannian space is the simplest non-Abelian degenerate Riemannian space that is completely different from a Euclidean space. By analogy with the Minkowski type problem in Euclidean space, the Minkowski type problem in Heisenberg groups is still open. In the present paper, we develop for the first time a sub-Riemannian version of Minkowski type problem in the horizontal distributions of Heisenberg groups, and further give a positive answer to this sub-Riemannian Minkowski type problem via the variational method.