Diagonal Minkowski classes, zonoid equivalence, and stable laws

Abstract

We consider the family of convex bodies obtained from an origin symmetric convex body [Formula: see text] by multiplication with diagonal matrices, by forming Minkowski sums of the transformed sets, and by taking limits in the Hausdorff metric. Support functions of these convex bodies arise by an integral transform of measures on the family of diagonal matrices, equivalently, on Euclidean space, which we call [Formula: see text]-transform. In the special case, if [Formula: see text] is a segment not lying on any coordinate hyperplane, one obtains the family of zonoids and the cosine transform. In this case two facts are known: the vector space generated by support functions of zonoids is dense in the family of support functions of origin symmetric convex bodies; and the cosine transform is injective. We show that these two properties are equivalent for general [Formula: see text]. For [Formula: see text] being a generalized zonoid, we determine conditions that ensure the injectivity of the [Formula: see text]-transform. Relations to mixed volumes and to a geometric description of one-sided stable laws are discussed. The later probabilistic application motivates our study of a family of convex bodies obtained as limits of sums of diagonally scaled [Formula: see text]-balls.