Singularities of parallel surfaces

Abstract

We investigate singularities of all parallel surfaces to a given regular surface. In generic context, the types of singularities of parallel surfaces are cuspidal edge, swallowtail, cuspidal lips, cuspidal beaks, cuspidal butterfly and 3-dimensional $D_4^{\pm }$ singularities. We give criteria for these singularities types in terms of differential geometry (Theorem 3.4 and 3.5).

24 pages, final version, to appear in Tohoku Mathematical Journal