On the largest size of sum-free sets in symmetric regions

Abstract

A subset $S$ of a group $G$ is said to be sum-free (resp. $Δ$-free) if there are no solutions to $a+b=c$ (resp. $a+b+c=0$) with $a,b,c\in S$. For a convex region $R\subset\mathbb{R}^d$, let $σ(R)$ denote the maximal proportion of the volume of $R$ that a sum-free subset of $R$ can occupy. We prove that $σ([-1,1]^d)=1/2$. Our proof employs a careful application of the Brunn-Minkowski inequality. Moreover, for the $d$-dimensional Euclidean ball $\mathbb{B}^d(0,1)$, we show that $σ(\mathbb{B}^d(0,1))\leq 1/2+o_d(1)$. We present two arguments for this. The first combines some routine harmonic analysis on the sphere with known bounds on values of the ultraspherical polynomials. The second more elementary argument proceeds by establishing that the maximal $Δ$-free subset of the unit sphere $\mathbb{S}^{d-1}$ occupies $1/2+O(d^{-1})$ of the sphere's surface measure. This answers a question raised by Bukh.