Sparse Bounds for Amoeba Contours

Abstract

We derive new upper bounds for the real degree of the contour of the amoeba of algebraic curves and hypersurfaces. Our approach refines the Pfaffian method of Lang--Shapiro--Shustin by replacing large total-degree estimates with logarithmic-conormal elimination and sparse mixed-volume techniques based on the transformed Newton polytopes. This yields universal bounds together with significantly sharper sparse estimates for broad classes of Laurent polynomials. Several comparisons and explicit examples illustrate the improvement of the new bounds over the previously known universal estimates.

28 pages, all comments are welcome