Notes on the roots of Ehrhart polynomials

Abstract

We determine lattice polytopes of smallest volume with a given number of interior lattice points. We show that the Ehrhart polynomials of those with one interior lattice point have largest roots with norm of order n^2, where n is the dimension. This improves on the previously best known bound n and complements a recent result of Braun where it is shown that the norm of a root of an Ehrhart polynomial is at most of order n^2. For the class of 0-symmetric lattice polytopes we present a conjecture on the smallest volume for a given number of interior lattice points and prove the conjecture for crosspolytopes. We further give a characterisation of the roots of the Ehrhart polyomials in the 3-dimensional case and we classify for n\leq 4 all lattice polytopes whose roots of their Ehrhart polynomials have all real part -1/2. These polytopes belong to the class of reflexive polytopes.