Generalized intersection bodies

We study the structures of two types of generalizations of intersection-bodies and the problem of whether they are in fact equivalent. Intersection-bodies were introduced by Lutwak and played a key role in the solution of the Busemann-Petty problem. A natural geometric generalization of this problem considered by Zhang, led him to introduce one type of generalized intersection-bodies. A second type was introduced by Koldobsky, who studied a different analytic generalization of this problem. Koldobsky also studied the connection between these two types of bodies, and noted that an equivalence between these two notions would completely settle the unresolved cases in the generalized Busemann-Petty problem. We show that these classes share many identical structural properties, proving the same results using integral geometry techniques for Zhang's class and Fourier transform techniques for Koldobsky's class. Using a functional analytic approach, we give several surprising equivalent formulations for the equivalence problem, which reveal a deep connection to several fundamental problems in the integral geometry of the Grassmann manifold. (C) 2006 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.